The appeals court looked to a decades-old "abstraction, filtration, comparison" test. In essence, that test requires the judge and jury to play the role of a pa

The appeals court looked to a decades-old "abstraction, filtration, comparison" test. In essence, that test requires the judge and jury to play the role of a patent examiner. See slip opinion at pages 23, 40. The expense and uncertainty aren't much fun for either party (or for the judge, jury, and law clerks for that matter). But yippee, say the IP litigators, because cases like this require lots of billable hours. EDIT in response to @crashandburn4: Oracle still hasn't won the case, because the appeals court ordered a retrial of Google's fair-use defense, as to which the jury deadlocked in the first trial. See the slip opinion at pages 60-62 (and preceding pages if you want the legal background).