5 ms·
Looks like the "idea" of the patent in the description is to use a predictor to predict when a STORE and LOAD alias and not speculate the LOAD and any instructi
by devit 11y ago
Looks like the "idea" of the patent in the description is to use a predictor to predict when a STORE and LOAD alias and not speculate the LOAD and any instruction depending on the load (although the claims generalize this to any non-static dependency).
As it generally happens in software/hardware patents, the claimed solution seems quite obvious whenever one wants to solve that particular problem, and the hard part is the "execution", i.e. implementing it efficiently and figuring out whether the tradeoffs are worth it.
So assigning patents to things like this seems really dumb.
- bardworx 11y agoI strongly agree with you. To patent an idea with no definition of execution seems too broad to me. An easy example is to patent an "opening mechanism that requires force" (door). Yes, that's an idea but can have different ways to execute, sliding door, regular opening door, suicide doors. Now a patent on the hinge that performs the operation seems more concrete. The exact execution of said idea.
- roc 11y agoLuckily, patents aren't granted for ideas, but for specific executions. Granted, the execution is generally defined at a higher level than, say, "this exact chunk of silicon". But it's at a much lower level than the "idea".
- Tloewald 11y agoWhen it comes to digital technology patents are often granted for ideas or concepts so general as to be ridiculous. Whether those patents stand up in court is another thing but even there -- as in this case -- there are no guarantees of sanity. I hope Apple will appeal.
- baldfat 11y agoThe more general and broad the patent the more valuable it is. The system rewards big general patents.
- ajross 11y agoIn the case in question, there appears to be no implementation or execution by the UW folks, certainly not one appropriated by Apple. This looks like an "idea" about instruction scheduling to me.
- mzs 11y ago5.1 Methodology The results we present have been collected on a simulator that faithfully represents a Multiscalar processor. http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.7.7876&rep=rep1&type=pdf http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.7.7... Dynamic Speculation and Synchronization of Data Dependences, Moshovos et al, Proc. ISCA-24, June 1997
- kumarm 11y agoThe patent is at least more innovative than Slide to Unlock. If you encourage crappy patents, they are gonna bite you some day.
- tambourine_man 11y agoI actually think slide to unlock is brilliant, specially the old skeuomorphic ”track on rail” one. The new, cleaner one is made possible by old one being burned into our collective unconscious. I also think “one click to buy” is brilliant. Since it's impossible to unambiguously distinguish between crappy and worthy patents, we should either abolish them, or have them last for a really short time, like a year or two. Plenty for the inventor to secure its return on the research's investment, not enough to stifle innovation.
- jsprogrammer 11y agoSomething can be brilliant without being innovative. Most people have no problems operating a "slide your finger on the screen to do more" widget, even without being trained by Apple's original visuals. Think about it. A touch screen can only detect a limited number of basic interactions. All interactions with the software must occur through those basic primitives. Touching the screen and moving your finger are really the only two things the interface can recognize.
- RIMR 11y agoI think you're conflating "brilliant" with "obvious". It's like if someone was called brilliant for suggesting that we should turn our phone screens off when they aren't in use to save battery. It's just the obvious solution, and patenting it and enforcing that patent is just meant to create obstacles for competitors. Apple thinks it own the very idea of the smartphone. They even claimed they owned curved corners... It is nice to see them get a taste of their own medicine. It would be great if they won, just so we could use the precedent to make them lose all of the asinine lawsuits they start.
- 11y ago
- wsxcde 11y agoWhat is your basis for the claim they've not evaluated the tradeoffs or tried to design an efficient implementation? The patent seems to be based on this paper: http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=264189 http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=264189. It has an extensive experimental evaluation. Another thing to keep in mind is that Sohi, Vijaykumar and Moshovos are all respected computer architecture researchers, and this paper was published in ISCA, which is the best and most competitive forum for computer architecture research.
- hueving 11y agoThat might be true, but that doesn't mean it's something that should be patented.
- wsxcde 11y agoWould you like to expand on why you think it shouldn't be patented? Architectural optimizations are often dismissed by outsiders as being "obvious", but what they don't see are all the other "obvious" ideas that don't work for various subtle reasons. I worry that if you make these techniques unpatentable, they'd become trade secrets and nobody would publish them, and we'd be worse off as a community.
- beambot 11y agoI hear that "nobody would publish" argument bandied about... but is there any evidence to back it up? These were University researchers. It's not like they're in it for the crazy-$$. In my experience, they'd publish anyway... for all the right reasons: furthering humanity, intellectual curiosity, academic prestige, etc.
- rayiner 11y agoUniversity researchers like John Hennessy (current President of Stanford), who made a bunch of money founding MIPS and Atheros (both of which were valued heavily for their patent portfolios)?