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Win 8 Patent Lawsuit

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Tinman57:
The patents even use Microsoft's marketing term, "Tiles".  I just wonder how MS missed these patents and didn't get ahead of the issue long before releasing Win8.
-mwb1100 (November 02, 2012, 03:18 AM)
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  Goes way back to how MS stole code from CP/M.  MS seems to have made themselves from the hard work of others throughout their lifetime....

40hz:
Goes way back to how MS stole code from CP/M.
-Tinman57 (November 02, 2012, 07:31 PM)
--- End quote ---

My understanding was it was Tim Paterson of Seattle Computer Products who borrowed certain parts of CP/M for 86-DOS which was famously acquired for $75K by Microsoft and renamed MS-DOS.

But it's not really right to say it was stolen since it was generally understood (back in the early 80s) that software was neither patentable nor able to be copyrighted since code was considered merely a set of instructions.

Programmers freely "borrowed" what they could. Sometimes with the original creator's consent. And sometimes (ok...mostly) without. About your only options - if you didn't want pieces of your product reworked into somebody else's - was to obscure your code, lock up your source, and attempt to copy protect your distribution media.

Short of direct theft by breaking into a vault, or resorting to some form of corporate espionage, pretty much anything else was considered fair play. Reverse engineering. Cloning the "look & feel." Cross-compiling. Porting to a new piece of hardware. All was fair in love an software back then.

It's one reason why so much progress (and money) was made so quickly. A broken patent system, complete with its IP Troll entourage, wouldn't rear its ugly head till many years later.
 8)

xtabber:
Goes way back to how MS stole code from CP/M.
-Tinman57 (November 02, 2012, 07:31 PM)
--- End quote ---

My understanding was it was Tim Paterson of Seattle Computer Products who borrowed certain parts of CP/M for 86-DOS which was famously acquired for $75K by Microsoft and renamed MS-DOS.

-40hz (November 02, 2012, 07:52 PM)
--- End quote ---

IIRC, Tim Paterson's OS was named QDOS, for Quick and Dirty OS.

One major problem with CP/M was the addressing of physical disk sectors, which led to incompatible formats from nearly every hardware manufacturer. It also could not handle the larger hard disks that were coming on the market (>10MB !!!). Paterson solved that with the File Allocation Table (FAT), which was a major reason QDOS/MS-DOS quickly eclipsed CP/M and CP/M-86.

mwb1100:
Also, I don't think there are allegations that code was 'stolen', but that the API was copied.  Much in the same way that DR-DOS copied MS-DOS and Linux copied Unix. Or how Compaq and Phoenix copied the IBM-PC's BIOS interface and unleashed the entire industry of PC clone machines.

86-DOS provided a level of source code compatibility with CP/M for applications.  For example, it was relatively easy for the CP/M program WordStar to be ported to 86-DOS/MS-DOS/PC-DOS.

The landscape of personal computing would be very much different if this kind of imitation were not considered legitimate.

Paterson has written a few blog articles that outline his version of events and general early personal computing history.  The articles are likely of interest to some people here:

  - http://dosmandrivel.blogspot.com/

40hz:
Also interesting is the chapter on CP/M in Bob Cringely's book Accidental Empires:
How the Boys of Silicon Valley Make Their Millions, Battle Foreign Competition, and Still Can't Get a Date.

Especially the part where he tells a slightly different version of the famous story about how Digital Research missed the boat when IBM came calling looking for an OS for their PC. It puts a whole new face on the incident even if the details and outcome of the story are the same.

The chapters on Bill Gates, his first "business" (the TrafOData program) and the early days of Microsoft are even more so since they provide insight into how Gates & Co. sees the world.

Cringely's book was also the basis of the 2-1/2 hour 3-part PBS series Triumph of the Nerds. It's a must see IMHO. You can find it on Youtube(see below), or at the Top Documentary Films website.

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Youtube links (may be blocked for some regions):

Part 1: Impressing Their Friends
Part 2: Riding the Bear
Part 3: Great Artist Steal

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