Re: 1-Click, Short-Click, Long-Click, More-Clicks (New Microsoft Patent)

[Barry Margolin]

In article <c6p9gv$qu5$1@blue.rahul.net>,
 c.c.eiftj@1-ClickXXS.usenet.us.com (Rahul Dhesi) wrote:

> Barry Margolin <barmar@alum.mit.edu> writes:
> 
> >In article <c6ov74$o41$1@blue.rahul.net>,
> > c.c.eiftj@1-ClickXXS.usenet.us.com (Rahul Dhesi) wrote:
> 
> >> Barry Margolin <barmar@alum.mit.edu> writes:
> >> 
> >> >Do you consider advancing the numbers to be "opening an application"?  I 
> >> >don't think anyone would seriously consider that to be the same thing as 
> >> >the patented methods.
> >> 
> >> What does it mean to "open" an "application"?
> 
> >Since the patent doesn't bother to define them, I assume they're being 
> >used in their normal sense when discussing computer use.
> 
> In other words, there is no clearly-defined meaning.  Presumably whoever
> drafted that patent carefully selected ambiguous terms that could later
> be interpreted to mean lots of things.

Does the information given in the Description section of the patent 
count?  It uses the verb "launch" rather than "open", but it's pretty 
clear what common computer activity is referred to.

-- 
Barry Margolin, barmar@alum.mit.edu
Arlington, MA
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