On January 20th, Apple has been awarded with patent #7,479,949, titled Touch screen device, method, and graphical user interface for determining commands by applying heuristics.
The patent, which was originally filed on April 11, 2008, is a long detailed description of the technology, with the abstract reading:
“A computer-implemented method for use in conjunction with a computing device with a touch screen display comprises: detecting one or more finger contacts with the touch screen display, applying one or more heuristics to the one or more finger contacts to determine a command for the device, and processing the command. The one or more heuristics comprise: a heuristic for determining that the one or more finger contacts correspond to a one-dimensional vertical screen scrolling command, a heuristic for determining that the one or more finger contacts correspond to a two-dimensional screen translation command, and a heuristic for determining that the one or more finger contacts correspond to a command to transition from displaying a respective item in a set of items to displaying a next item in the set of items.”
This is a blow to Palm since Apple hinted that they would vigorously defend their intellectual property behind the iPhone. Well, we just have to wait and see how this play out in the end. I’m pretty sure that the tech community have their eyes on this issue. [MacRumors]
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