🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <878@nddsun1.sps.mot.com> waters@nddsun1.sps.mot.com (Mike
Waters) writes: 
>See above. I have already described how to do a patent search for under
>$10, and most of that (here at least) is for parking fees!

Part of the problem is the shear scope of what would have to be
searched for.  Do I have to search for something as simple as linked
lists?  Or fancy XOR techniques?  Or using include files?  Or binary
trees?  Or hashing?

I may use a dozen or two techniques in any given program.  Even at $10
a pop, this can get expensive.  Also, I can't do this all the time
from just the abstract of patents.  While it takes little tine to grep
through all the patents for XOR or hash or whatever, it takes a fair
amount of time to figure out just what exactly is being claimed by a
patent.  It also may be claimed in prose rather than using the current
technical term.

Have you ever read a patent?  They are very hard to understand w/o
studying them for extended periods of time.  I feel that this time is
better spent writing and testing code rather than checking out n
patents that may, on the surface, appear to cover what I want to do.
They are written to be as obscure as possible w/o causing the patent
to be rejected.

Maybe the hardest thing for me to grasp is how so many obvious things
are patented.  Do you do a search for 2+2=4?  Then why would you do
one for XOR?  After all, it is just a special mathematcal function.  I
know that it is patented, but what about the other couple of dozen
things that I learned in school/on the job.....

Warner

-- 
Warner Losh		imp@Solbourne.COM
We sing about Beauty and we sing about Truth at $10,000 a show.