Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!aplcen!uakari.primate.wisc.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!pt.cs.cmu.edu!andrew.cmu.edu!aw1r+
From: aw1r+@andrew.cmu.edu (Alfred Benjamin Woodard)
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: Patents and Architecture
Message-ID: <waWCIhq00VIEIKyIUo@andrew.cmu.edu>
Date: 27 Jun 90 16:56:13 GMT
References: <62864@sgi.sgi.com>
Organization: Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA
Lines: 44
In-Reply-To: <62864@sgi.sgi.com>

Many good points have been posted as to the results of having patents
on hardware. I will admit that patents do encorage innovation but in
the real world of programming you become non-productive if you try to
rely on all your own ideas. If someone has a good idea then you should
use it. For instance the xor cursor (ignore for a moment the legal
side of this), using xor to map a cursor onto the screen was a good
idea. It makes the cursor seem opaque and on top of everything else.
This sort of fits with what we think a cursor should be. So why not
use it? Do we need more inovation in this area. Through resarch and
innovation how likely are we to come up with something as easy to
implement as fast and as close to the intuitive concept of a cursor.

Now for something as complecated as a gui there should be some new
innovaton. However as the innovation continues, people that currently
are using gui's like finder begin to adopt whatever they are using as
their intuitive understanding of what a gui should be. So programmers
try to implement the current perception of what a gui should look like
and it comes out looking like finder. I don't see any problem with
this.

What I think we are seeing is the fact that computer science has
matured to the point where some things can solidify, however there are
some things that don't have the refinement nessesary to solidify. I
think that this is normal in any field.

The constant ports of unix to other machines is just proof that unix
provides what some users think should be provided by an operating
system but it keeps being revised and updated as this perception
changes so it is undergoing a form of innovation. It is not yet ready
to solidify. Mac os and VMS are just other perceptions of what an
operating system should do. As time goes by some new opperating
systems will spring up and others will die. The same will happen with
applications and every other kind of software. Is there any problem
with this. 

In conclusion I think that it is wrong to say that there is no new
software development. It may not be as pronounced as when computers
were first new but it still is there. People have found out some of
the things that computers can do -- spreadsheets word processing
etc... and as the hardware develops there will be a constant need  to
make the new hardware capable of doing the same things as the old. I
see nothing wrong with this. It is just another form of evolution.

-ben