[LINK] Microsoft patent...

[Crispin Harris]

On Fri, Aug 7, 2009 at 3:13 PM, Roger Clarke <Roger.Clarke at xamax.com.au>wrote:

> At 16:37 +1000 7/8/09, Bernard Robertson-Dunn wrote:
> >.... for a word-processing document stored in a single XML file that may
> >be manipulated by applications that understand XML
> >http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?patentnumber=7,571,169
> >
> >Abstract
> >A word processor including a native XML file format is provided. The
> >well formed XML file fully represents the word-processor document, and
> >fully supports 100% of word-processor's rich formatting. There are no
> >feature losses when saving the word-processor documents as XML. A
> >published XSD file defines all the rules behind the word-processor's XML
> >file format. Hints may be provided within the XML associated files
> >providing applications that understand XML a shortcut to understanding
> >some of the features provided by the word-processor. The word-processing
> >document is stored in a single XML file. Additionally, manipulation of
> >word-processing documents may be done on computing devices that do not
> >include the word-processor itself.
>
> Oh dear, it must be Friday and shortly before beer time.
>
> 1.  Showing my scepticism about patents, and USPTO patents examiners:
>
> "SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
> "The present invention is directed at providing a word-processing
> document in a native XML file format that may be understood by an
> application that understands XML, or to enable another application or
> service to create a rich document in XML so that the word-processing
> application can open it as if it was one of its own documents. "
>
> This wasn't utterly obvious long before the priority date ??
>
> The priority date seems to be June 2002, but might be December 6, 2004.
>
> Ignoring the gestation period from 1990 onwards:
> -   Formal XML specs seem to date to 1998:
>     http://www.w3.org/XML/
> -   XML Schema specs ditto:
>     http://www.w3.org/XML/Schema
> -   XML DTDs appear to have been formalised even earlier?
>
> And wouldn't the entire history of SGML, and then HTML, show that a
> word-processor that uses any native ML as its native storage-format
> is trivially different from its predecessor editors / word-processors
> that used predecessor MLs as *their* native-formats??
>

Hmmm - thinks - wasn't FrameMaker (an Adobe product now) a word processor
that would use native XML for word processing fuctions?

I remember using FrameMaker in 1996.

It was SGML/XML/DTD based - and I still wish I had it for writing policies
and other multiply-repeated documents (like Policies or Training courses)
today..

Cheers,
   C
-- 
Crispin Harris
crispin.harris at gmail.com
"The communist authorities in Beijing should understand that nearly every
educated person has read George Orwell's 1984, and are impervious to their
zany totalitarian logic. People are not sheep that will simply shout 'four
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- Mr Michael Danby MP (Australian Federal Parlimentarian demonstrating both
his education and literature awareness at the same time!)