@DiskDoctor

You do not know what you are talking about.

Patents must cover specific inventions. You cannot patent MS Office. You would have to identify specific inventions in MS Office. Other office software can choose to implement a different version of the feature without using that invention.

IIRC Sun released the source to StarOffice under GPL and that became OO.org.

Furthermore, member countries of the EU still retain control over their individual
patent systems but there is also an EU patent office. If I want to patent something
I can do it here in GB or send it to the EU or go for an international patent (PCT). These days one files a patent in the countries that they think they will sell their invention but not necessarily every country.

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Actually...:

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Hair-splitting I know :)

Why has this thread degenerated into an IP argument? Its about getting some new cool functionality on Morphos and to suggest new ideas...

Expose is more eye candy than a feature, you can make the same without it, im afraid if morphos becomes a osx wannabe :(

kickstart

Eye candy my eye! It makes me miles more productive on my powerbook. especially @ work - sometimes I have 15 windows open.

I also like the Vista 3d feature that lets you pick windowsin 3d as well..

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Don't do that! Seriously, you are forced to work like that? That's horrible. May "Alt-Tab" help you?

@magnetic

Maybe jpv's answer can be usefull for you and dont need all the unusefull apple things! =)

I think that, for some time now, an Expose-like feature became pretty much a norm and many people simply expect some equivalent of it out of box since the vast majority of the new MorphOS users will be people who grew up on something else than an old Amiga Even if not, they will see it at the office or at the friend's using it.

It's just another of those features that a regular users will immediately reach for and won't be happy with a workaround nor an explanation why they don't need it.

Only expect to discover much more of those lamer/newbie/joe user features as (and if) MorphOS widens the audience...

Then again, there could be a bounty for that... If it's that trivial, put some money in and let someone implement it quickly.

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Yeah, great attitude to invite new users, calling them lamers and newbies. Fantastic.

You did not get it

I called myself that because that's how I was perceived when I complained earlier

Uhm, sorry, indeed I did not get it, consider my post unposted :)

jcmarcos

Dont do that? what do you mean? I have to have that many windows open 'm in production.. Expose is the sh8t its one of my fav things of osx

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Aha. What's that application that you use, that requires so many open windows? That can't be good user interface design. On the other hand, I remember the opposite in some music trackers, which have everything onscreen at once. They look like an spaceship cockpit...

On my desk I have a Peg II and a Mac(intel). If you are used to the Pegasos-behaviour of screens then the Mac is a pain in the ass (even after a year). I suppose if you are used to Expose it will be the other way....

Regards Tom

Hmm, I don't understand the point with this "Expose" feature.

We already can pop to front any desired window (or screen) with the depth menu isn't it? (and for the screens we can even set a hotkey).

[ Edited by Jeckel on 2010/1/29 15:31 ]

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and i still think that's the best kind of design.
for a pilot, in a cockpit, everything is displayed under your eyes, you wouldn't imagine a plane cockpit with some drawers to access some of the pilot commands : )
Same with a software, i really hate all theses menus, submenus, multi endless tabs etc... you loose too much time accessing them.

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I can explain it, expose is cool the firsts times after it is just like another eye-candy-cpu-eater like osx dock bar. Hmmmm... thinking about it osx can be just a skin of darwin =)

Always imho.

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expose is hardly a cpu eater, the windows are just textures and the gpu does all the work -which is hardly a gpu eater as well. In fact I think it's one of few things I missed when I left MacOS X.

i dont think so, expose isnt fluid all times at least on ppc macs but if expose needs some cores and some gigabites maybe isnt a good desing... but ok is from apple and is cool.

[ Edited by kickstart on 2010/1/29 18:30 ]

> openoffice isn't much legal in the us since MS Office is patented per se and one
> cannot "create similar software, having basically all the same features". So in the
> US, oo violates MS Office.

Little anecdote recently told by the former SUN CEO:

"As in life, bluster and threat are commonplace in business - especially the technology business. So that interaction was good preparation for a later meeting with Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer. They'd flown in over a weekend to meet with Scott McNealy, Sun's then CEO - who asked me and Greg Papadopoulos (Sun's CTO) to accompany him. As we sat down in our Menlo Park conference room, Bill skipped the small talk, and went straight to the point, "Microsoft owns the office productivity market, and our patents read all over OpenOffice." OpenOffice is a free office productivity suite found on tens of millions of desktops worldwide. It's a tremendous brand ambassador for its owner - it also limits the appeal of Microsoft Office to businesses and those forced to pirate it. Bill was delivering a slightly more sophisticated variant of the threat Steve had made, but he had a different solution in mind. "We're happy to get you under license." That was code for "We'll go away if you pay us a royalty for every download" - the digital version of a protection racket. Royalty bearing free software? Jumbo shrimp. (Oxymoron.) But fearing this was on the agenda, we were prepared for the meeting. Microsoft is no stranger to imitating successful products, then leveraging their distribution power to eliminate a competitive threat - from tablet computing to search engines, their inspiration is often obvious (I'm trying to like Bing, I really am). So when they created their web application platform, .NET, it was obvious their designers had been staring at Java - which was exactly my retort. "We've looked at .NET, and you're trampling all over a huge number of Java patents. So what will you pay us for every copy of Windows?" Bill explained the software business was all about building variable revenue streams from a fixed engineering cost base, so royalties didn't fit with their model... which is to say, it was a short meeting."
http://jonathanischwartz.wordpress.com/2010/03/09/good-artists-copy-great-artists-steal/