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As a side note looks like Adobe has a patent(!) on tabs... And it expires today! https://patents.google.com/patent/US5546528 https://patents.google.com/patent/

As a side note looks like Adobe has a patent(!) on tabs... And it expires today! https://patents.google.com/patent/US5546528 https://patents.google.com/patent/US5546528

DonHopkins 7y ago
Hurray!!! Indeed it is! >2019-06-14 Application status is Expired - Lifetime Wow, thank you for catching that and pointing it out, so I can celebrate just in time! How did you happen to coincidentally run across that fact today? ;) (I have always believed was illegitimate and invalidated by a lot of prior art, but I didn't realize that its death date was imminent.)
- akovaski 7y ago
  Google patents always shows the current date for that line. It actually expired back in 2014. https://patents.google.com/patent/US991876A/en https://patents.google.com/patent/US991876A/en
  - DonHopkins 7y ago
    Oh, Google... You mean I should have started rejoicing five years ago??! Well better late than never. At least I don't have to have my Cotton Gin Patent Expiration Party on the same day as my Tabbed Windows Patent Expiration Party.
EForEndeavour 7y ago
Have all tabbed applications and browsers been paying royalties to Adobe? If not, have they technically been in violation of the patent this whole time? What were the real-world implications of this patent?
- DonHopkins 7y ago
  Adobe's illegitimate tabbed window patent was intended to fuck over Macromedia. And then later they bought Macromedia. Adobe sues Macromedia over infringement of their patented tabbed palettes (August 10, 2000): https://www.metafilter.com/2805/Adobe-sues-Macromedia-over-infringement-of-their-patented-tabbed-palettes https://www.metafilter.com/2805/Adobe-sues-Macromedia-over-i... >"Adobe filed a lawsuit against Macromedia® alleging infringement of our intellectual property, specifically our patented tabbed palette, which is a key user interface element and method invented by Adobe and incorporated into our products." >"Adobe's tabbed palette patent is Adobe's method of displaying and working with multiple sets of information in the same area of the computer screen. The patented invention allows users to customize how the functions in the product are organized on the workspace. This invention was a significant leap forward for customers' productivity and personalization of the interface." In 1989 the NeWS PSIBER Space Deck supported tabbed nested windows that users could drag around separately on the screen or group together on a visual representation of the PostScript stack, use "direct stack manipulation" to push and pop and rearrange the PostScript stack by dragging, and use pie menus to switch the side of the tab, pull-out to adjust layout parameters, issue commands, etc. https://medium.com/@donhopkins/the-shape-of-psiber-space-october-1989-19e2dfa4d91e https://medium.com/@donhopkins/the-shape-of-psiber-space-oct... Ironic that it was part of a visual interface to Adobe's own PostScript programming language (in Sun's NeWS window system implemented by James Gosling), so they had to pretend not to know about it, in order to fraudulently obtain their tabbed window patent through willful blindness. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willful_blindness https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willful_blindness I know for certain that at least one high level person at Adobe was aware of it, since I corresponded with Glenn Reid at Adobe about PostScript quite often before during and after its development, and credited his PostScript book and his work on Distillery in the references of that paper. >Adobe Systems; Reid, Glenn C.: PostScript Language Program Design (The Green Book); 1988; Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, Inc., Reading, Mass. >Reid, Glenn: The Distillery (program); available from ps-file-server@adobe.com There's not much incentive for a company to pay Adobe licensing fees for such an obviously invalid, fraudulent patent. But it costs a huge amount of money and time to challenge a bad patent like that and clean up the hot mess of bullshit that Adobe dumped on the world of user interface design, far beyond my means or the means of most non-giga-corporations.

As a side note looks like Adobe has a patent(!) on tabs... And it expires today! https://patents.google.com/patent/US5546528 https://patents.google.com/patent/US5546528

DonHopkins 7y ago

Hurray!!! Indeed it is! >2019-06-14 Application status is Expired - Lifetime Wow, thank you for catching that and pointing it out, so I can celebrate just in time! How did you happen to coincidentally run across that fact today? ;) (I have always believed was illegitimate and invalidated by a lot of prior art, but I didn't realize that its death date was imminent.)

akovaski 7y ago
Google patents always shows the current date for that line. It actually expired back in 2014. https://patents.google.com/patent/US991876A/en https://patents.google.com/patent/US991876A/en
- DonHopkins 7y ago
  Oh, Google... You mean I should have started rejoicing five years ago??! Well better late than never. At least I don't have to have my Cotton Gin Patent Expiration Party on the same day as my Tabbed Windows Patent Expiration Party.

EForEndeavour 7y ago

Have all tabbed applications and browsers been paying royalties to Adobe? If not, have they technically been in violation of the patent this whole time? What were the real-world implications of this patent?

DonHopkins 7y ago
Adobe's illegitimate tabbed window patent was intended to fuck over Macromedia. And then later they bought Macromedia. Adobe sues Macromedia over infringement of their patented tabbed palettes (August 10, 2000): https://www.metafilter.com/2805/Adobe-sues-Macromedia-over-infringement-of-their-patented-tabbed-palettes https://www.metafilter.com/2805/Adobe-sues-Macromedia-over-i... >"Adobe filed a lawsuit against Macromedia® alleging infringement of our intellectual property, specifically our patented tabbed palette, which is a key user interface element and method invented by Adobe and incorporated into our products." >"Adobe's tabbed palette patent is Adobe's method of displaying and working with multiple sets of information in the same area of the computer screen. The patented invention allows users to customize how the functions in the product are organized on the workspace. This invention was a significant leap forward for customers' productivity and personalization of the interface." In 1989 the NeWS PSIBER Space Deck supported tabbed nested windows that users could drag around separately on the screen or group together on a visual representation of the PostScript stack, use "direct stack manipulation" to push and pop and rearrange the PostScript stack by dragging, and use pie menus to switch the side of the tab, pull-out to adjust layout parameters, issue commands, etc. https://medium.com/@donhopkins/the-shape-of-psiber-space-october-1989-19e2dfa4d91e https://medium.com/@donhopkins/the-shape-of-psiber-space-oct... Ironic that it was part of a visual interface to Adobe's own PostScript programming language (in Sun's NeWS window system implemented by James Gosling), so they had to pretend not to know about it, in order to fraudulently obtain their tabbed window patent through willful blindness. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willful_blindness https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willful_blindness I know for certain that at least one high level person at Adobe was aware of it, since I corresponded with Glenn Reid at Adobe about PostScript quite often before during and after its development, and credited his PostScript book and his work on Distillery in the references of that paper. >Adobe Systems; Reid, Glenn C.: PostScript Language Program Design (The Green Book); 1988; Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, Inc., Reading, Mass. >Reid, Glenn: The Distillery (program); available from ps-file-server@adobe.com There's not much incentive for a company to pay Adobe licensing fees for such an obviously invalid, fraudulent patent. But it costs a huge amount of money and time to challenge a bad patent like that and clean up the hot mess of bullshit that Adobe dumped on the world of user interface design, far beyond my means or the means of most non-giga-corporations.