Linked by Thom Holwerda on Mon 4th Apr 2011 20:05 UTC, submitted by JAlexoid
Considering the massive FUD-attack currently underway against Android vendors, this news doesn't come as a particular surprise: Google has announced plans to acquire Nortel's immense patent portfolio for defensive purposes. Google's blog post on the matter couldn't be more bitter and direct.
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Member since:2009-10-24
"software is already protected by copyright. Hence, software should not be patentable
This is another gray area. What is the difference really between a chemical formula and a block of code? Both are the blueprint on how the final product is created. A material is patentable as well as the process in which to create it, I see no real difference with software. "
After some further thought, a counter point would be, books.
The language in which it was written in, is not patented nor is the final product itself (the book) but rather copyrighted.
Yet software is neither a book or a chemical compound.
However I do agree with the fact that the patent system does need to be updated and reformed, as times have changed.
Member since:2011-01-28
Abstract,
"This is another gray area. What is the difference really between a chemical formula and a block of code? Both are the blueprint on how the final product is created. A material is patentable as well as the process in which to create it, I see no real difference with software."
You are mistaken, it's not grey at all. Copyright inhibits copying, and protects people's works including software from trivial mass copying.
Patents grant ownership of an idea to a single patent holder. In the software field, it is a virtual guarantee that between the millions of developers, some will invent (although "derive" is sometimes more accurate) the same algorithm completely independently. Why should one developer be granted a monopoly for his work at the expense of all other developers? Why don't they deserve to profit from their own work? The patent system prevent us from selling and even using our own work which is considered original in terms of copyright. In all likelihood, the patent holder is probably not even the original inventor.
Code to programmers is like words to writers, why should patents hold us back from expressing our own ideas? How terrible would it be if ideas in literature were patented?
Those who believe in patents on software need to take a serious look at how impractical it is to use the information publicly disclosed in patent applications. They are written by lawyers for lawyers. I've never seen any programmers who were stumped on a coding problem and get help from USPTO patent filings. So where is the public benefit?
Say what you will about patents in other disciplines, but at least for software, they make no sense.
News
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/19/13 23:15 UTC
"This is my NeXTstation Turbo Color booting the Mac System 7.1 Operating System using a hardware add-on called 'Daydream'. The Daydream has a Mac ROM and a few custom ICs in it and hooked up to the NeXTs DSP port. Turns your NeXT into a full fledged 68k powered Mac." So cool.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/19/13 23:11 UTC, submitted by Drumhellar
"The NetBSD Project is pleased to announce NetBSD 6.1, the first feature update of the NetBSD 6 release branch. It represents a selected subset of fixes deemed important for security or stability reasons, as well as new features and enhancements. Please note that all fixes in the prior security/bugfix updates (NetBSD 6.0.1 and 6.0.2) are also in 6.1."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/18/13 21:06 UTC
"At the end of a week in which Electronic Arts confirmed it wasn't developing a thing for the Wii U, one of the software engineers in EA Sports' Canada studio, in a series of since-deleted tweets, disparaged the console as 'crap' and suggested Nintendo should give up on hardware altogether. 'The Wii U is crap. Less powerful than an Xbox 360. Poor online/store. Weird tablet', tweeted Bob Summerwill, listed as a senior software engineer at EA Canada, in a reply to a tweet posting a link about EA's no-Wii U news. 'Nintendo are walking dead at this point'." The Wii U is turning into the 21st century's Virtual Boy.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/18/13 7:37 UTC
"In NixOS, the entire operating system - the kernel, applications, system packages, configuration files, and so on - is built by the Nix package manager from a description in a purely functional build language. The fact that it's purely functional essentially means that building a new configuration cannot overwrite previous configurations. Most of the other features follow from this." Interesting approach. A Linux distribution, sure, but with some very refreshing ideas about system configuration.
Linked by fran on 05/18/13 1:38 UTC
Appfour added, among other features, C/C++ support to its new version of AIDE. From Android-IDE, "Now you can write parts of your app or your whole app in C/C++ on your device. AIDE supports the Standard Android NDK toolchain (GCC 4.6 + Bionic, STL, ...). No changes are necessary if you want to build an app developed on a PC with Eclipse. C/C++ development is fully integrated: Build errors appear in the error list and files can easily be navigated to with Go to file. The editor supports C/C++ syntax highlighting."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/17/13 23:35 UTC, submitted by kragil
Ars nails it: "The answer is that Google did announce what amounts to a fairly substantial Android update yesterday. They simply did it without adding to the update fragmentation problems that continue to plague the platform. By focusing on these changes and not the apparently-waiting-in-the-wings update to the core software, Google is showing us one of the ways in which it's trying to fix the update problem."
Linked by MOS6510 on 05/17/13 22:22 UTC
"It is good for programmers to understand what goes on inside a processor. The CPU is at the heart of our career. What goes on inside the CPU? How long does it take for one instruction to run? What does it mean when a new CPU has a 12-stage pipeline, or 18-stage pipeline, or even a 'deep' 31-stage pipeline? Programs generally treat the CPU as a black box. Instructions go into the box in order, instructions come out of the box in order, and some processing magic happens inside. As a programmer, it is useful to learn what happens inside the box. This is especially true if you will be working on tasks like program optimization. If you don't know what is going on inside the CPU, how can you optimize for it? This article is about what goes on inside the x86 processor's deep pipeline."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/17/13 22:15 UTC, submitted by Tom
"It was the only moment I heard regret slip into Otellini's voice during the several hours of conversations I had with him. 'The lesson I took away from that was, while we like to speak with data around here, so many times in my career I've ended up making decisions with my gut, and I should have followed my gut,' he said. 'My gut told me to say yes.'" The world would've been a much different place - Apple would have been less dependant on Samsung for its chips, which probably would've meant less money for Samsung to develop its Galaxy business.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/16/13 21:41 UTC
Glass is getting some love at Google I/O as well. New applications have been released - Facebook, Twitter, Evernote, Elle, Tumblr, and CNN. Perhaps more interesting: the newly announced Google Glass Developer Kit will allow offline applications and direct hardware access - great for hacking and expanding Glass' potential. This kit will really allow hackers to put Glass through its paces.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/16/13 17:04 UTC
"But Beck and Merrill decided that simply banning toxic players wasn't an acceptable solution for their game. Riot Games began experimenting with more constructive modes of player management through a formal player behavior initiative that actually conducts controlled experiments on its player base to see what helps reduce bad behavior. The results of that initiative have been shared at a lecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and on panels at the Penny Arcade Expo East and the Game Developers Conference." Absolutely fascinating stuff. I'm a League of Legends player, and to be honest, the community isn't nearly as bad as some make it out to be. I'm happy Riot games has the guts to employ science to address the issue.More News »
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About you.
Uncle Thom meet kettle, kettle meet Uncle Thom.
Some of your "suggestions" aren't bad, though you have some short sightedness to a few.
Allowing variable lengths can/will lead to gray areas, better to have the same amount of time apply to all patents.
I think this is a good idea also. See the response above. So with all patents having the same amount of time, they should all expire without extension when that time expires.
What would be the incentive to fund (wether it is via employment, grants, etc..) a person to research if you could not get a ROI?
Sure Einstein started his work while working as a patent clerk, and Apple started in a garage, but thats not always the case, some of our greatest achievements are from people being funded which allowed them to focus on their research.
I agree with this partially, the wording should probably be a bit clearer. Instead of "accompany" the patent application the prototype should be made available to a patent clerk prior to being awarded. Somethings maybe to large to send to the patent office, but I agree with the working prototype as to just theory.
This is another gray area. What is the difference really between a chemical formula and a block of code? Both are the blueprint on how the final product is created. A material is patentable as well as the process in which to create it, I see no real difference with software.
Gray area again. This can easily be abused, somethings would be clear cut, others not so much. Besides where would be the incentive? If you can have your IP taken from you without compensation. A good example would be the movie "Flash of Genius" the intermittent wind shield wiper, it was the best way to do a wiper and therefore the safest application of one, so should the inventor not be entitled to compensation?