The patent descriptions sound so vague. I'm not saying that Samsung is the white-hat in this, but there has to be a line when it comes to technology. Patenting "auto complete" and suing because of it is just a jerk thing to do.
Speaking of jerk things to do, you're on the front page and you've ilsted some of the patents, so I'm going to pick on you. But I won't be mean. Promise.
So they patented:
universal interface for retrieval of information in a computer system
Looking up information on a computer system. Really? I'm pretty sure all computers do that. Even old less-smart phones had a search to get contacts and such. It just wasn't one-textbox to search everything-at-once. BUT... computers and PIM's have been doing that for years.
Keep in mind that there's no rule that the title of a patent accurately and completely reflect the contents of the patent.
Anyways, I read through the patent. The basics are that Apple, in 2001, patented a meta-search system utilizing plug-ins. My guess is that this was from Sherlock. The idea is that you describe what you're searching for (could be as simple as a text search box), and then the system hands the query to multiple pluggable search agents. Its not a bad patent for 2001, and it's been referenced by a lot of other patents, issued to IBM, Microsoft, and others. I don't know what particular aspect of the S4 Apple thinks they can go after with this - S-Voice perhaps?
graphical user interface using historical lists with field classes
Auto-complete showing historic entries. Really? Every browser since 1995 does that. Heck even some old less-smart phones did that.
That's mostly what this patent is. I was reading through it, and at first I was thinking, "Hey - this is probably the OS9 keychain!", but it looks like this work mostly came out of the Newton. It's actually a bit more subtle than a simple history list, though. The patent makes a big deal about how input fields are set up into 'classes' and can therefore be shared between applications. That's why I immediately thought of the keychain. Anyhoo, you type something into a field in one application, and then you can use it again in a field with the same 'class' in another application.
Incidentally, this patent was filed in 1995, and auto-complete didn't come to browsers until 1997 with Netscape 4. And that was just the URL bar - not form fields. In fact, Microsoft later (in 1999) filed a patent, US6651217 B1, called "System and method for populating forms with previously used data values" which patents form auto-fill and references this patent.
It makes you realize just how much forward-thinking went into the Newton.
asynchronous data synchronization amongst devices
Your device syncs up with other similar devices via a cloud or something. Not really innovation.
I read the patent and it describes a synchronization protocol for locking shared resources, dividing resources into classes, and synchronizing between multiple devices. I thought of CoreData when I saw this, but most likely its MobileMe/iCloud. One of the other key characteristics of this is that the clients are databases in and of themselves - local changes are meant to be propagated back to centralized databases and to other devices. In particular, I think this is what would distinguish it from a simple database with a bunch of distributed views.
I'm not sure what to make of this. I think it's fair to say that Apple now has a patent on a very particular synchronization protocol, but how generally could this be applied? And what prior art could be used against this? The patent was filed fairly recently (2007). Would ActiveSync/Exchange be prior art? Not really, because communications between the server and the client in the activesync protocol is more asymmetrical - this patent describes a system where new data could be generated anywhere in a distributed synchronization network and then be propagated. Also, the patent makes a big deal about data 'classes' - it generalizes the concept of synchronizing data with pluggable data class handlers, which definitely isn't in ActiveSync.
Fair enough, but what part of the S4 could possibly violate this patent?
System and method for performing an action on a structure in computer-generated data
This is the only one I can't tell what they're saying. From a larger description it sounds like passing data-structure to a server, using that structured data to do something, and return it. That sounds like old-hat stuff as well, but I could be reading it incorrectly.
This is interesting. To me, this sounds like the way iOS/OSX can embed hotlinks in your document when it detects that there's a phone number or an address in the text of the document. It describes a system where you hand a document or some other displayable data off to a widget or something and the widget sends it to an analyzer which finds stuff like phone numbers and addresses and then associates them with handlers (i.e. open up the phone app and dial the number or open the calendar app and create an event).
Ok - no big deal, right? Android-does-this-Winmo-does-this-lots-of-prior-art-and-apple-sucks-and-why-dont-they-just-stop-suing-everyone-and-lets-abolish-patents. But look at the filing date for this one - 1996! My guess is that again this comes from the Newton. I can't think of any software I was using back in 1996 that would do on-the-fly text analysis and insert actions into the document view. Even COM/OLE was still young back in 1996. It also appears to be a very foundational patent - tons of patents reference this one.
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I read somewhere that there is a world outside USA but perhaps I can be wrong.
Salesmen all over the world get spiffs for selling Galaxy phones.
