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Apple Rotating Display?

maybe it was apple's intention to reduce functionality of the G4 iMac, -hh? after all, the G4 iMac will be a very hard one (in design innovation terms)to top, when they do finally replace it. maybe a full desk lamp style articulation along with display rotation will be the killer feature of the new iMac?

having said that, think about it, a rotating display is a novel feature, but quite wasted on what is basically a consumer device. It would be smarter to implement this feedom of articulation in a pro. machine? After all, that field will have the far greater need for it. i cant see a lot of people playing quake in portrait o_O haha
 
Not the obvious issue

This patent is NOT trying to do a patent on a swivel display. There are several of those displays out there and in the summary the patent author discloses that they exist as he must. This is not at all a patent for a new monitor.

This patent is about a specific implementation of doing the translations for the rotating images on the screen. It is about doing the processing of the imagery so it is rotation independent and allows rotations in any direction with minimal processing.

As a person with a few patents (one for a system recently given authorization for funding by the U.S. Government for $1.5 billion) and a few of the patents having over 100 claims in them, I will make some informed comments about patents for all here.

First: you can't patent an idea -- only a specific implementation of an idea. Apple seems to be patenting a specific implementation of how to do the processing for rotating monitors. They are not trying to lay claim to all versions of rotating monitors or the concept that the transformations can be done.

Second: you can't patent anything you have disclosed publicly, without restriction, for more than one year prior to the date of your filing. This means that if you talked to your best buddy about the idea -- without telling him UP FRONT that it was a secret -- then you waited 367 days from that conversation to file for your patent then your patent can be successfully challenged and killed. It is not worth filing. The one year period has absolutely nothing to do with selling anything. It has to do with unrestricted public disclosure. Bye-the-bye, the act of filing a formal patent application is considered a public disclosure. If you don't move forward with the patent and get the USPTO to formally consider your patent within one year of filing your initial disclosure with the USPTO then your patent is dead forever.

Third: Patents typically issue in under two years, but can take many years to issue. There are SEVERAL formal steps along the way to a patent getting issued. A patent being issued is just the last step. Some inventors keep modifying their patents and getting the USPTO to not issue the patent for specific reasons ... one such reason is they don't want the VCs investing in them to be able to shop the patent out from under them. There are many other reasons than this too.

Fourth: You can patent variations on a theme. This happens often. (Patent a bag with a single loop handle. Then patent a bag with double loop handles so long as the implementation of the double loop handle is distinctly different from the single loop handle, etc.) In some circles these are called "fence patents". You have a very valuable core patent and then you file lots of variations on that patent. Then if anyone wants to attack the core patent they must attack the fence patents too -- often making the attack much more difficult.

Fifth: You MUST do your homework on a patent. You MUST do a reasonable search of the industry in which your patent is applicable. Everything of an historical nature which has direct bearing on the uniqueness of your patent of which you are aware must be disclosed in your patent application. This is referred to as "prior art". You must give explicit examples if you know of them. You don't have to give all examples. This does not mean you have to do a 100% exhaustive search to find out everything possible. However, it does mean you have to put forth reasonable effort. Apple mentions prior art in their summary. They most likely mention more in the full disclosure.

Sixth: the U.S. is one of the few countries which still has a "first to invent" rule rather than a "first to file" rule. This means that in the U.S. the real inventor is the important one. If you can prove you invented something and disclosed it publicly before someone else's patent filing for their "invention" then you can very likely kill their patent -- if you so disire. In a "first to file" country it does not matter if you invented it first. You did not file for the patent. (The hazard in a "first to file" country is that you could discuss an idea with someone then through the grapevine someone could hear of it and file a few weeks later. This filing and patent, if issued, might stand up in court.)

Seventh: The USPTO recently changed the duration of patent validilty. It used to be 17 years from issue for the typical patent. It is now 20 years from the initial filing. (This used to be one of the reasons why people tried to keep the patent from issuing. As long as it was "patent pending", i.e., the patent was accepted for filing and was in review but not issued, the implementation got nearly the same rights as if the patent were issued. If you kept this up for 5 or 6 years then it issued and you got another 17 years then you could get protection for 22 or 23 years. The USPTO stopped this by going to a 20 year from initial filing ruling.)

Patenting things is not a trivial process. Sure, stupid things get through sometimes. Sure, sometimes things get a patent issued which have been in the public domain for several years before the patent application was filed. However, in general the USPTO does a good job.
 
Patents haven't instantly turned into products in the past, and I don't think this indicates a soon-to-be-released product either. I'm still waiting for the color-changing computer case we talked about after a previous patent.

I once got to try a Radius Pivot and I liked the idea of working in landscape for Hypercard-type projects and in portrait for word processing. Thesedays, web surfing and e-mail join word processing as a mostly vertical-orientation activity, while movie editing and viewing are important horizon-orientation activities. I like the quality of Apple's Cinema displays, but haven't bought one mainly due to their aspect ratio, which doesn't suit my most common tasks.
 
Borg3of5 said:
Those displays are absolutely fabulous! :) If Apple doesn't get on the ball and contract Eyegonomic to design the next gen displays, I will strongly consider the Eyegonomic 24" display. It's beautiful!!!
Click to expand...
It's also 4,000 dollars :(
 
Already have PIVOT Software and Monitors for Mac

The retail version of the ati Pro 9800 comes with software to rotate your screen. All you need is a monitor or LCD that pivots and the 9800 and you have rotating monitors....

Seems like no one knows this is already availabe for those that need it.

Best
JL
 
for the Mac?

are you sure? Why is this not available for 9600 and BTO 9800 G5s?

I have been told that there is no rotating software for OS X and that I should just get over it...

pretty annoying that I can do portrait mode with an old crappy Pentium 3 hooked up to my Samsung 213T, but not my G5...
 
shadowself said:
Second: you can't patent anything you have disclosed publicly, without restriction, for more than one year prior to the date of your filing. This means that if you talked to your best buddy about the idea -- without telling him UP FRONT that it was a secret -- then you waited 367 days from that conversation to file for your patent then your patent can be successfully challenged and killed. It is not worth filing. The one year period has absolutely nothing to do with selling anything. It has to do with unrestricted public disclosure. Bye-the-bye, the act of filing a formal patent application is considered a public disclosure. If you don't move forward with the patent and get the USPTO to formally consider your patent within one year of filing your initial disclosure with the USPTO then your patent is dead forever.
Click to expand...

1. Telling your friend would not constitute public disclosure (and, therefore, would not prevent a patent). However, if your friend went and wrote a paper on it or published an article, that would.

2. The 1 year limit absolutely has to do with selling. An invention can be sold even though it has not been publicly disclosed. For instance, if you invent a new kind of microchip fab process and use it to produce chips for sale. Even though the process was not disclosed the invention has been involved in a sale. You need to read up on 35 USC 102(b).

shadowself said:
Fifth: You MUST do your homework on a patent. You MUST do a reasonable search of the industry in which your patent is applicable. Everything of an historical nature which has direct bearing on the uniqueness of your patent of which you are aware must be disclosed in your patent application. This is referred to as "prior art". You must give explicit examples if you know of them. You don't have to give all examples. This does not mean you have to do a 100% exhaustive search to find out everything possible. However, it does mean you have to put forth reasonable effort. Apple mentions prior art in their summary. They most likely mention more in the full disclosure.
Click to expand...

A prior art search is not required by the applicant for all patent applications. However, and my memory is slipping here a bit, it may be required in a request to make the patent special (ie. it gets considered before other patents). It is true that if the applicant provides their own search it will smooth the process along.

shadowself said:
Patenting things is not a trivial process. Sure, stupid things get through sometimes. Sure, sometimes things get a patent issued which have been in the public domain for several years before the patent application was filed. However, in general the USPTO does a good job.
Click to expand...

Agreed. I have been studying for the patent bar since November!! Given the complexity of the task (by its very nature) I would agree that the USPTO does a pretty good job. Nothing's perfect though....and hopefully the courts can sort out the mistakes.
 
Liske said:
The retail version of the ati Pro 9800 comes with software to rotate your screen. All you need is a monitor or LCD that pivots and the 9800 and you have rotating monitors....

Seems like no one knows this is already availabe for those that need it.

Best
JL
Click to expand...

Really? This would have been a major announcement. There's rotating software IN BOX for the ATI 9800? Why didn't ATI say anything? Indicate a link please.
 
Nny said:
what apple should do is work on a software solution to make OS X work with those Windows-only pivot monitors that are already out there.... heck, everyone makes them now, but I don't think any support Mac OS X.
Click to expand...

I really don't understand why Apple hasn't done this already. I mean, if a video card can output 1280x1024 video, what could be so difficult about outputting 1024x1280? Just add a fex extra vertical/portrait resolutions to the Monitor Control Panel. If it were that easy, Apple would have done it already. So what's the technical hangup?

The ViewSonic ThinEdge 17" LCD on my wife's Wintel box has the pivot feature. I absolutely love portrait mode for working on long text documents, viewing PDFs, and reading long web pages. It's a shame that when I hook my 'Book to the LCD I am limited to landscape.

PS: A portrait/vertical display would go so nicely with the OS X Dock at the bottom of the screen!

Escher
 
Sorry guys - I screwed this one up. This is not a new patent but a re-issue of a patent filed in 1996 and granted in December 1998. The re-issue was filed in 2000 and granted on 3/23/04. The old patent is #5,854,641, the new patent is RE38,471. I guess I got confused by the complexity of the form. You should be able to find the patents on the www.uspto.gov site with those numbers.

HOWEVER, the new patent seems significantly different from the old one. It has 17 claims as opposed to 8 for the 1996 patent and the new claims seem to discuss more practical types of things, like the steps for rotating 90° and the hardware required whereas the old claims seemed more theoretical.

Also, the summary seems identical to the one from 1998, which explains the 640x480 resolution.

There are images on the USPTO site.

Someone with more experience with patents will have to explain this.
 
Gabriel said:
Sorry guys - I screwed this one up. This is not a new patent but a re-issue of a patent filed in 1996 and granted in December 1998. The re-issue was filed in 2000 and granted on 3/23/04. The old patent is #5,854,641, the new patent is RE38,471. I guess I got confused by the complexity of the form. You should be able to find the patents on the www.uspto.gov site with those numbers.

HOWEVER, the new patent seems significantly different from the old one. It has 17 claims as opposed to 8 for the 1996 patent and the new claims seem to discuss more practical types of things, like the steps for rotating 90° and the hardware required whereas the old claims seemed more theoretical.

Also, the summary seems identical to the one from 1998, which explains the 640x480 resolution.

There are images on the USPTO site.

Someone with more experience with patents will have to explain this.
Click to expand...

When filing a reissue patent you are basically saying, "our patent is defective." One possible defect is, "we claimed less than we were able to claim." Such a reissue is called a Broadening Reissue.

A Broadening Reissue has to be filed within 2 years of the original patent's grant date. New claims can be filed in a reissue. These claims have to be supported in the disclosure of the original patent application. The specification of a patent has a lot of description related to the invention claimed and will sometimes describe another invention or variant of the claimed invention. Patent protection for these can be added later through a reissue application (but, as I said, it has to be filed within 2 years of the patent date).

I hope that helps.
 
CrackedButter said:
Anybody remember those water toys you could get where you tip it upside down and the coloured oils would flow from top to bottom in interesting ways? Then tip it the other way and the oil would do the same again.

Imagine if you could tip the iMac screen into one view and the desktop (being 'aqua' and all) would gently wash itself into the new view as effortlessly as fast user switching.
Click to expand...

screw the iMac, i want that on the laptops, just so i can tip my iBook and watch peoples faces when they see the screen change. :D
 
sinbushar said:
...from what i've seen, its generally not the best idea to follow patent issues and what not...
Click to expand...

Well put. Patents are applied for years before they're granted. Most likely, the G5 has technologies in it that are patent pending. Then, in a couple years, those patents will be granted and we'll get all excited because there's a new patent about 64-bit computing... until someone realizes that it had to do with the initial release of the G5...
 
Escher said:
PS: A portrait/vertical display would go so nicely with the OS X Dock at the bottom of the screen!
Click to expand...
Your comment gives me an idea. How 'bout having a software option to let you rotate the dock too? In other words, if you normally have the dock at the bottom with the monitor in landscape orientation, you could choose whether it should remain at the bottom when you rotate to portrait orientation or whether it should rotate to the left/right side. That way, if you want the dock to have as much width/height as possible, you'd put it on the longest side of the monitor and it would stay against that side.
 
What about a new newton?

Could they be designing a new newton it would seem a logical direction for apple to go in. they could be combining the ipod with a pda or something. They have already built some of the functionality of a pda into the ipod but completing it with a full screen a pen would give it more appeal and not take much doing really. :confused:
 
I would think that this patent was for the Newton, as stated earlier. Though, I think it would be cool if Apple used a technology like this somehow. They could probably come up with a cool way to use it on the iMac. :cool:
 
5th Generation iPod I suspect, launching this time next year? 4th generation iPod should be out soon apparently, rumoured to be with colour screen & video out. Sync with iPhoto perhaps?

This tech is definitely most ideal for any handheld device with a larger screen. There are some handhelds doing this kind of thing already.
 
Well... It is what I suggested before to Apple.

Well.. a few months ago, I suggested the idea to the Apple.
I thought that the current cinema-oriented width/height ratio of Apple display may be good for watching movies, but it is not good for reading documents.
So, if the iMac's screen can be rotated, it would be very nice for reading documents, especially multicolumn thesis.
Notebook screens also can be applied.

Usually they send me "Thank you note" but this time, they didn't.
Did they think the same thing I thougth? Who knows?
 
Hmmmm

Liske said:
Yah you'd think ATI could capitalize on a monopoly. I guess they all went to Harvard Business School. The info is easily found on the web though....

http://www.ati.com/products/radeon9800/radeon9800prome/specs.html

Best,
JL
Click to expand...


The link you posted doesn't work and I called a friend at ATI - they said no such software or capability exists in ANY of their cards for the Mac - it does in PCs.
 
handheld hopes

I'm one of those optimistic people still waiting for an Apple pda. But i want to be able to work with full applications... you know, just keep shrinking that laptop 'til it's pocketable/wearable. Brighthand is associating this rumor in this way. They also offer the usual "we hear these rumors every year" disclaimer.
edit: If it's gsm capable, even better, or maybe bluetooth offers higher market penetration. Any thoughts? You know, besides the obligatory "There's no reason for x device because... I would never need it, It will be too expensive, I can't look at a screen smaller than 30", etc.
 
Macrumors said:
Readers are cautioned, however, that this particular patent, however, may simply represent Newton technology patents finally becoming processed. The patent summary notes that the rotation feature would be "especially advantageous for pen-based and hand-held computers". Apple's Newton 2x00 handheld computer did allow for this same portrait and landscape rotation.
Click to expand...

I used to have an eMate and that is exactly how the screen would work between keyboard and pen-input mode ... I wouldn't look at this being a feature for furture product lines
 
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