The issue isn't the "what," it's the "how. And the old who did it first argument is rather inane IMO. That's always bothered me about the Windows-stole-the-desktop-from-Macs mantra. The question is, whose implementation will prove more useful to users?
True from a user's standpoint. Maybe not from the company perspective.
MS actually has been talking about this sort of thing since 1997... yet Apple has the patent on the basic concept. Oops.
Leo Szilard has the patent on the basic fission nuclear bomb reaction and so what?
Basic idea, in this case, isn't worth much.
I've read the patent and I'm surprized that the patent was actually issued! One of the main requirement of a patent is that the idea covered in the patent is non-trivial to a person reasonably skilled in the applicable art.
I certainly don't get what is not trivial about a search engine where the engine narrows down the search as you give it more information when you type. That is, in fact, how you look up an entry an alphabetical list. One letter at a type until you narrow it to what you're looking for.
This patent smells a lot of a lawyer than of a scientist or an engineer.
I think you were looking at the wrong patent. Moreso, it sounds like you fundamentally misunderstand what Spotlight *is*.
Spotlight is analogous to Longhorn's much-touted, then much-stripped-down WinFS. It allows developers to write plugins to add specific data to an OS wide database that is searchable by the user. Not filename, not file date, file *contents*, whether it is text, binary, heck, even image metadata. It is developer-extensible, flexible, and fast.
What XP has is no different than the Find File feature that Macs and Windows have both had since about 1988.
It is not global. If an application is stuck or busy (even the front-most one), the beach ball appears only when the mouse pointer is on a window belonging to that application. Move the cursor somewhere else and the beach ball disappears.
The problem is that it's usually the Finder that is beachballing, and its range covers the desktop so it's hard to tell. Not to mention, the Finder is the most unstable app I regularly use and thus the most likely to not recover.
Comments
Originally posted by BuonRotto
The issue isn't the "what," it's the "how. And the old who did it first argument is rather inane IMO. That's always bothered me about the Windows-stole-the-desktop-from-Macs mantra. The question is, whose implementation will prove more useful to users?
True from a user's standpoint. Maybe not from the company perspective.
MS actually has been talking about this sort of thing since 1997... yet Apple has the patent on the basic concept. Oops.
Leo Szilard has the patent on the basic fission nuclear bomb reaction and so what?
Basic idea, in this case, isn't worth much.
I've read the patent and I'm surprized that the patent was actually issued! One of the main requirement of a patent is that the idea covered in the patent is non-trivial to a person reasonably skilled in the applicable art.
I certainly don't get what is not trivial about a search engine where the engine narrows down the search as you give it more information when you type. That is, in fact, how you look up an entry an alphabetical list. One letter at a type until you narrow it to what you're looking for.
This patent smells a lot of a lawyer than of a scientist or an engineer.
Spotlight is analogous to Longhorn's much-touted, then much-stripped-down WinFS. It allows developers to write plugins to add specific data to an OS wide database that is searchable by the user. Not filename, not file date, file *contents*, whether it is text, binary, heck, even image metadata. It is developer-extensible, flexible, and fast.
What XP has is no different than the Find File feature that Macs and Windows have both had since about 1988.
It is not global. If an application is stuck or busy (even the front-most one), the beach ball appears only when the mouse pointer is on a window belonging to that application. Move the cursor somewhere else and the beach ball disappears.
The problem is that it's usually the Finder that is beachballing, and its range covers the desktop so it's hard to tell. Not to mention, the Finder is the most unstable app I regularly use and thus the most likely to not recover.