Look at the MSN 4.0 alert boxes, they basically behave the same way. (They are clickable until they slowly fade away, with the exception that they don't come back). How different is 'different'?

...its patents like this that make me wonder if apple is in for the candy or not.

We are implementing trans fade ins and outs in apps we are working on *for mac os x*. So what, if apple gets this patent, app programmers can't do this?

How does this protect or help anything?

"Only Apple may use the On Screen Display paradigm."

Puh- and Leez-

It's an interesting question. My guess is that the method for using this UI would be available as an API in XCode that you and other developers could plug in as part of your application. You could implement it in your Mac OSX apps, but not in your x86 apps.

Not suggesting I have any inside (or other) knowledge, it just seems like that would be a likely direction for this invention.

Before I saw this patent I never knew there was a way to spell "Ukachaka."

What was stated above is not prior art since Apple is not patenting translucency but rather translucency in relation to other events in the UI and then the subsequent GUI state of the window and how it responds to events over a period of time and degree of use. So they are patenting the method. Anyway, I believe Apple's new Motion already has it implemented to a degree and we will probably see it as part of the new speech activated features in Tiger (Apple already told us that their will be new Speech recognition features coming).

Very cool. It's good to see that all the new effects (including Expose) are not mere Windows dressing but actually improve the UI experience. Let's hope it is as great as Expose has been...

"What was stated above is not prior art since Apple is not patenting translucency but rather translucency in relation to other events in the UI and then the subsequent GUI state of the window and how it responds to events over a period of time and degree of use"

What that decribes is the On Screen Display paradigm. You see it EVERYDAY on TVs, Monitors Etc.

"responds to events over time and degree of use" heheheh. What, like pressing volume up or volume down?

They describe in detail, putting up an alert, showing status, and fading offscreen.

Oh! Oh! and we throw in "have the status fade and change, should in fact it need to" written in tech- and legalese to fool the overworked patent examiners, and gullable fanboy types, into believeing apple *invented* something.

OSD is commonplace. This is predatory, and will not just effect people "hoping M$ doesn't steal it for Longshanks-or-whatever-its -called now"...this could effect what coders *for apples own platform* may be able to do.

What's worse, its a bogus assertion Not patententable.

The whole system for granting patents has become absurd. What's next, a patent for a method of using a muscle to manipulate a diaphgram in such a way as to expand a cavity into which air may be drawn?

There are many things which are reasonably patentable. I don't think we're examining one of them.

There could be something more interesting at work here. This particular patent application is a "continuation" of Patent 6,670,970 filed in December 1999, which falls under the terms of the 1997 patent exchange Apple and MS (which is publicly available on the US DOJ web site as an antitrust exhibit). Essentially, Microsoft and Apple have free access to each other's patents filed up until August 2002. So maybe someone who understands patent law can explain: what is a patent continuation, and would Microsoft be denied use of it if it is granted? Is that why Apple is filing such an obviously dated (based on the Rhapsody-styled diagrams) patent in 2003?

Quote

Guest wrote:
There could be something more interesting at work here. This particular patent application is a "continuation" of Patent 6,670,970 filed in December 1999, which falls under the terms of the 1997 patent exchange Apple and MS (which is publicly available on the US DOJ web site as an antitrust exhibit). Essentially, Microsoft and Apple have free access to each other's patents filed up until August 2002. So maybe someone who understands patent law can explain: what is a patent continuation, and would Microsoft be denied use of it if it is granted? Is that why Apple is filing such an obviously dated (based on the Rhapsody-styled diagrams) patent in 2003?

Thanks for the note Guest, I've added an addendum noting the continuation. Now on to your question. A few of caveats: 1) This is WILD SPECULATION on my part. 2) This is in no way legal advice. I'm not your lawyer. If you need legal advise you should find a lawyer and ask your questions to see how the law applies to your circumstances (as even slight differences in facts can cause completely different outcomes). 3) Enough butt covering...

Often when patents are filed, some of the patent claims are allowed, while other patent claims are not allowed. The claims define your invention and what you’re entitled to. What is often done is the person seeking a patent says "ok, I'll take what I can get for now Mr. Examiner at the USPTO. Please issue a patent on the claims you allowed." Then for the claims that were not allowed and that require more arguments back and forth between the patent office and lawyers; in such situations a divisional/continuation may be filed. So the allowed claims issue as a patent, those that were not allowed are divided out and form the basis of a new application. And as the subsequent patent applications based on those rejected claims are rejected over time, they may be continued allowing the lawyers to make more arguments to get the patent allowed.

Now why does it work like that? Well there are tons of reasons, most of which are more innocuous than what you'll see in the law lecture I link to below. The major reason is when you write a patent application some of the claims are really broad, and some are more narrow. The USPTO patent Examiner will allow the narrow claims, and it will simply be more of a fight to convince the Examiner that the applicant deserves the broader claim. There are a tons of other reasons, and if you check out the video you'll get a decent overview.

So it may be a simple matter of that; they are just continuing on with some claims that were originally rejected. Now where things get interesting is as you allude to, the agreement with Microsoft to cross-license each other's patents was part of that $150Mill investment. It may include patents for up until the agreement terminates; I would guess. Often such agreements if drafted well will include all continuations, divisionals etc., for X number of years after the termination of the agreement, but sometimes not. So if the agreement is up, then there is value in pursuing such continuations that Microsoft would not have the benefit because the term ran out.

One of the readers brought up a nice "conspiracy" theory in that Apple will hold all of these UI patents over Microsoft’s head. Basically that Microsoft would have to continue to make Office or Apple would sue Microsoft if Microsoft tried to use such UI elements. Who knows. Maybe.

Anyway, if you want to know more about the fundamentals of patent continuations (first, are you feeling well? you can find a nice lecture here:

http://realserver.law.duke.edu/ramgen/spring04/lemley.rm
http://www.law.duke.edu/cspd/articles/lemley.doc

I think it's interesting that Apple's lead on reasearch scientist is all into speech recognition. Doesn't that tell everyone where Apple's newest UI direction is headed? I think this is pretty cool and exciting.

Well, if people are going to be filing patents like this, I'd rather it be Apple than Microsoft... Im sure many would say "amen".

couldn't agree more.

http://www.directfb.org/screenshots/index.xml

The directfb project has had translucent windows for an age (and I don't mean snapshotting the background image underneath).

I think this is the correct link...

http://www.extremetech.com/slideshow/0,1555,p=1&s=&a=126556&po=3&i=1,00.asp