[Debian-uk] Symbian get UK patent on linking to a DLL - analysis wanted

[Wookey]

Hello people, somewhat tengential to this list, but I know many of you
care about this stuff, and one has to start somewhere.

Things have ben relatively quiet in software-patent world for a couple
of years and court cases have gone reasonably well from our point of
view, with the UK patent office maving away from the European patent
office practice of granting patents for all sorts of garbage, and
generally refusing them for any software which didn't have a proper
external effect beyond the software itself. However things have just
taken a serious turn for the worse and action is needed again to
prevent all software becoming patentable in this country.

Symbian have just won a High Court case where the UK patent office refused
them a patent on 'indirect linking to DLLs', but the court overturned
that and it has been granted. The UKPO is appealing this to the court
of appeal, but it needs help to show that this _is_ a controversial
issue and not just something that should be nodded through. 

The UKPO refusal is here, and it also describes the patent reasonably
well:
http://www.ipo.gov.uk/patent/p-decisionmaking/p-challenge/p-challenge-decision-results/o20907.pdf

We (FFII and killsoftwarepatents.com) would be interested to know
which pieces of software will be infringing this - can anyone here
give examples, or other analysis of this? Feel free to pass this mail
on to people who might.

Keep an eye out for further action on this. Note that the UKPO are
currently the good guys here, Symbian (and the EPO) are the bad guys. 

Wookey
-- 
Principal hats:  Balloonz - Toby Churchill - Aleph One - Debian
http://wookware.org/