Taskbar grouping patented by MS - Mentions kde-look ml as reference

[Stefan Taferner]

On Saturday 03 July 2004 13:58, Lukáš Tinkl wrote:
> Dne so 3. července 2004 13:26 Karl-Heinz Zimmer napsal(a):
> > Am Samstag, 3. Juli 2004 02:10 schrieb Pupeno:
> > > On Friday July 2 2004 07:10, Torsten Rahn wrote:
> > > > http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1
> > > >&
> > > >
> > > > http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=113191&threshold=2&commentsort=0&
> > > >ti d=15 5&mode=nested&cid=9589101
> > >
> > > So, what happens now ? taskbar grouping will have to be removed from
> > > KDE ? Where does this patent apply ? USA ? world ?
> >
> > Even worse: They also have patented the _taskbar_ itself!
> >
> > see: United States Patent 5920316
> > filed November 4, 1997
> > http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect2=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=%
> >2F
> > netahtml%2Fsearch-bool.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&d=PALL&RefSrch=yes&Query=PN%2F59
> >203 16
> >
> > Wasn't there any "taskbar with Start menu button" prior-art before 1997?
> >
> > Karl-Heinz
>
> Didn't the first KDE release (in 1996?) include a taskbar?

Kde was later than Win95.

But there was the Motif Desktop which had this launcher window on the bottom 
middle with several menus. Maybe other file managers had something similar
to taskbars. How about fvwm?

These Microsoft patents are good examples why Europe should not get
software patents, IMO.

--Stefan