> When someone advocating a position lies to me, as this submitter did, I figure the reason they are lying about the issue is because they realize that the truth doesn't support their position.

I don't think it's flat-out lying. I think it's an example of the echo chamber effect.

The community believes that patents suck, that patent examiners are inept, and that patentees are using clever tricks to patent things that aren't new. So upon encountering any new patent, the submitters here don't do the hard work of reading the patent, parsing through the difficult claim language, and determining what it's all about. Instead, they read the title, maybe glance briefly at the abstract and the claims, and come up with a "basically, it's (something really simple)" summary, and post it as evidence of their beliefs about the patent system. A bunch of commenters then accept that summary without consideration, since it's yet another example of "bad patents," so they post a supporting rant about patents and increment their mental "bad patents I've seen recently" counter by one.

Of course, that process is flawed if the summary is an oversimplification of the claimed technique. Like this submitter concluding that the very specific technique presented in the independent claims is "basically, it's deleting temporary files," or "basically, it's deleting temporary files based on a modification date." But it's accepted without question because it supports the beliefs of the group. Hence, echo chamber.

> If you had a distributed file which kept a timestamp on each of several separate chunks, how would you go about deciding when to automatically delete it? My guess is that the solution you would come up with quickly is basically the one in the patent.

Well, there are several ways you could deal with that problem. Here are some of them:

• * Deal with each chunk separately. Just let each machine decide when to delete its chunk.
• * Consider all of the chunks to have been modified as of the latest modification date on all of them. Sort all of the temp filed by modification date, and cull the oldest ones first.
• * Consider all of the chunks to have been modified as of the earliest modification date on all of them. Sort all of the temp filed by modification date, and cull the oldest ones first.
• * Consider all of the chunks to have been modified as of the average of the modification dates. Sort all of the temp filed by modification date, and cull the oldest ones first.
• * Consider all of the chunks to have been modified as of the file date listed in the shared filename. Update the modification dates accordingly, and then let each machine deal with its chunk independently of the others.
• * Consider all of the chunks to have been modified as of the file date listed in the shared filename. Update the modification dates accordingly, sort all of the time files by modification date, and cull the oldest ones first.

...etc. There are many, many variations on this technique that you might imagine. The one described in this patent is different from all of them:

deriving a file time to live for the file from the path name; determining a weighted file time to live for the file by reducing the file time to live by an offset, where the offset is determined by multiplying the file time to live by a percentage of memory space storage quota used by the user profile; selecting a latest modification time from the modification times of the plurality of chunks;...

...which is why the patent was issued.

> This is supposed to be new....

If by "that" you mean the invention described in the title - "Automatic Deletion of Temporary Files" - then, no.

Patent titles are as meaningful as book titles: you wouldn't assume that two books entitled "Pirate Adventure" relate the same story, right? It's the same with patents: a completely new type of automobile engine might have the title, "Automobile Engine."

If by "that" you mean the invention described in the independent claim, which is this -

1. A computer-implemented method comprising: selecting a file having a path name in a distributed file system, wherein the file is divided into a plurality of chunks that are distributed among a plurality of servers, wherein each chunk has a modification time indicating when the chunk was last modified, and wherein at least two of the modification times are different; identifying a user profile associated with the file; determining a memory space storage quota usage for the user profile; deriving a file time to live for the file from the path name; determining a weighted file time to live for the file by reducing the file time to live by an offset, where the offset is determined by multiplying the file time to live by a percentage of memory space storage quota used by the user profile; selecting a latest modification time from the modification times of the plurality of chunks; determining that an elapsed time based on the latest modification time is equal to or exceeds the weighted file time to live; and deleting all of the chunks of the file responsive to the determining.

...then presenting that invention as "new" seems legitimate. There are several details in here - dealing with a temporary file as chunks across several file stores, each chunk having a different modification time; and determining the "weighted file time to live" based on the last modification time and the percentage of consumed file quota - that seem completely new.

The author of this Slashdot post appears to have glanced at the claims, reached the conclusion that "basically, it's about deleting temporary files," and posted this rant about how the patent office granted a patent for "deleting temporary files," inspiring yet another wave of diatribes about the patent office based on a faulty assumption. Not surprising - this kind of tilting at windmills, based on factually incorrect interpretations of patents, is a daily occurrence here.

> "If none of the consoles can play used games I could see the price of games coming down. AAA titles may come out at $45 or $50 instead of $60."

:lol: Right. Because when publishers eliminate the only legitimate source of price competition for their titles, they will become benevolent toward their customers and cut the price out of... good-naturedness? Rather than, you know, jacking up the rates for Halo XVIII through the roof, because they know that customers would sell a kidney to play Master Chef again?

Let me get this straight: You're asserting that because email is susceptible to flaws, it's de facto inferior to handing in a hard copy? ... which is apparently flawless?

At least the vulnerabilities of email can be addressed. If the university's mail system is applying some false positive spam rules to legitimate email sent within the mail system, that flaw is demonstrable, repeatable, and correctable. By contrast, there is simply no solution for "yes, I turned it in / no, you didn't."

Coincidentally, this was posted two hours after my EE lab TA asked us to ignore the directions at the end of the lab assignment about submitting it to Blackboard, and instructed us NOT to submit it via email. Instead, we were directed to submit it via hard copy. To be clear, these lab assignments involve programming in a $200+ mathematics package. And these instructions were given in the computer lab, surrounded by tons of machines that have internet access... but no printer. I can't even begin to imagine the logic behind that decision. I mean, Blackboard sucks, but isn't email submission (using the GMU email system that that we are required to use for classes) more convenient for everyone, more environmentally friendly, AND verifiable?

Yeah, this.

Mid-2011, I was driving through the Rocky Mountains in Colorado along a road that would around the outside of a canyon. My GPS told me to take a right turn onto "Route 82d." You know what was off to my right? Nothing. A steep degrade, through a bunch of trees, and ending up in the canyon maybe 50 feet down.

I was so shocked by it that I turned around, drove the route again, and captured it with my phone: link

Bottom line: Don't blindly trust your GPS.

Please remove yourself from the human race

:) Thanks for the suggestion. No plans to do that any time soon. I believe quite strongly that my work makes the software industry a better place for consumers. Also, I really enjoy what I do, and I'm really good at it.

DRM is bad.

What about DRM in a voting machine that restricts the processor from executing any code that's not signed by a trusted source? Or in an ATM? Those scnearios seem indisputably white-hat to me.

This article makes a mistake that I've seen a hundred times before on Slashdot: confusing "the patent says...", and "the patentee intends to..."

I write software patents for a living. (I didn't write this one.) Let me describe how the patent drafting process goes.

A client comes to me with a simple invention - we'd like to do (A), (B), and (C) to achieve result (X). I talk to them at length about what (ABC) is, and what critically sets (ABC) apart from every similar example. I ask questions about how each of (A), (B), and (C) could be varied; what other elements (D), (E), and/or (F) could be added; and whether (ABC) could also be used for results (Y) or (Z).

And when I write up the patent application, EVERYTHING goes in there. (ABC) is described as the base invention, but all of the other material about (D), (E), (F), (X), (Y), and (Z) is also included as optional extensions or uses of (ABC).

Now, here's the critical thing: I haven't fully considered whether (D) is a desirable feature, or whether (Y) is a desirable result. My client doesn't even know, or says, "we don't really intend to implement (D) or do (X)." None of that is relevant. All that matters is: They are all logical, valid extensions of (ABC), so, typically, they all go in. Anything that could make the basic technique more valuable, appear more useful, or might more fully distinguish (ABC) over known techniques is helpful to add to the specification.

I read this patent the same way. The basic invention is: "Use a camera to count and identify people interacting with a device." Now, you can't just stop there - you haven't said what that information might be used for, and the patent office typically rejects applications that look like, "The technique is: Generate some data." So the patent discloses several uses of that information. That doesn't mean that Microsoft has any interest in using that technique - only that it's logically achievable from the basic techniques.

Look, we all agree that technology is neutral, right? For example, DRM has been *used* for lots of obnoxious purposes (including limiting fair-use rights), but the basic technology of DRM is neither good nor bad - it just is. The same principle applies here.

> You can bet the farm that because of this all major online retailers have already started work to change their registration and ordering systems to implement a clickthrough rather than ticking a checkbox that says 'I agree'.

Ah, but many of those ToS'es include terms that are supposed to apply to activities that don't require registration or ordering - e.g., ToS restrictions on copying content to another site, linking to the site without permission, or suing the company due to information presented on the website.

So, coming next: Visitng ANY major site, even anonymously, will present you with a click-through ToS before you get ANYTHING from them. And to ensure that it remains legal and binding (especially as ToS frequently change), the selection will not be persisted in a cookie; you'll have to complete the ToS click-through at the start of every new session with the website.

Ugh. The web is about to become uglier.

The initial impression is that he's describing a computer with a TV-tuner that does X, Y, and Z that are common functions already present in common software packages and/or as built-in OS features.

Every invention is a combination of previously known parts. What makes it an invention is a combination in a new way that provides new advantages. The first airplane was a combination of a known type of engine and some known aerodynamic structures.

Certainly, having video editing software in a TiVo-like device is a desirable feature (a quick Google search turns up a lot of people asking about it around 2006... four years after this patent was filed), and that combination hadn't been made yet. That makes it a patentable invention.

That's what it describes, at any level, so that's all I needed to read.

You're free to assert that "this patent should not have been issued based on my understanding of the prior art." (And then we can have a discussion about what constitutes prior art.)

But you're not free to assert incorrect statements about "what the patent covers," which you gleaned by failing to read the claims. That is factually incorrect, and blatantly disregards how the patent system works. Worse, it's a very common mistake at Slashdot - other people in this very same thread are arguing, "the only thing that matters in the patent is the abstract / brief summary; the claims are irrelevant."

If you really want to criticize a system, you should try to understand its basic operation first. Pretty simple stuff.

> Actually, that's not true. Yes, the claims are used in court. But the full description of the patent, not the claims, are the basis for the PTO's approval or rejection. The claims are simply checked for accuracy -- are they properly descriptive of what's contained in the main body of the patent or not.

That's just horribly wrong. It's practically the exact opposite of reality.

Patent prosecution focuses ALMOST COMPLETELY on the content of the claims - and specifically the independent claims. The entire rest of the patent application - the title, background section, brief summary, detailed description, figures, abstract - exist primarily to support the claims (in addition to a few other minimal requirements - the written description requirement, the enablement requirement, and the "best mode" requirement).

I talk to examiners at the Patent & Trademark Office several times a week. In most cases, our conversation is ONLY about the claims. And in many cases, I feel quite certain that the examiner has only read the claims - the examiner often has ignored or misunderstood the invention and the field of art. I have to explain the invention to them by reiterating the content of the specification, because they didn't read it; they just read the claims. And that's because the claims are really all that matters in the patent.

> 1. You can be relatively certain from the summary.

No, you can't. You have to read the claims. The summary section has nothing to do with the scope of the patent, and is often very different from the claims. Many patents don't even HAVE a summary section, because it's not required.

If you HAD read the claims, you'd have come across this: "wherein the system controller module provides a user-selectable option of editing one or more sections of the one or more video files..." Does your TiVo allow you to edit sections of video files? No? If so, then the patent isn't "essentially a TiVo."

The takeaway message from this hopefully humbling experience is simple: FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, READ THE INDEPENDENT CLAIMS BEFORE YOU JUMP TO ANY CONCLUSION ABOUT WHAT A PATENT COVERS. Don't just read the title, or the abstract, or the background, or PART of the independent claim. READ THE WHOLE INDEPENDENT CLAIM. Slashdotters are horrible about this, and they get these types of patent issues wrong over and over and over again.

> I'm sorry, but I shouldn't have to RTFA just to understand the key word in the summary ("memristor"). It's sloppy writing not to explain it.

>

Couple with that the title "U.S. patent officer." There's no such thing.

Blaise Mouttet is a former patent *examiner* for the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office. The USPTO currently employs over 6,000 patent examiners, each of whom is expected to be of "ordinary skill in the art." There's no indication that this individual's opinion is any more significant than that of any other electrical engineer.

Either it's an error, or the title was sexed up to fabricate an aura of expertise. Can anyone explain why this article made it to the front page of Slashdot?