EP0394160: Dynamic progress marking icon (IBM (US)) http://swpat.ffii.org/patents/txt/ep/0394/160/ Claims: 1. The well-known progress bar, additionally in generalized version, i.e. with different symbols inside which appear or disappear in configurable order; in text or graphics mode (e.g. "characters" are rectangles in graphics mode); different shapes instead of bars as one row: e.g. matrix shape 2. quantisation with work units 3. quantisation with time 4. identification of next location to change (overwrite with "progress sign") with look up table 5. proceeding (next entry) in look up table 6. choice of initially present characters (all equal) 7. choice of individual initially present characters 8. like 6., with "non-graphics" characters, e.g. "%" 9. choice of "non-displayable" characters as "progress signs", e.g. blank 10. choice of "displayable" characters as "progress signs", e.g. letter 11. initialization of look up table 12. computer system implementing 1. (partially) 13. like 12., determining amount of work (e.g. number of work units) 14. like 13., with replacement of individual characters (well-known progress function) 15. like 14., amount = number of work units 16. like 14., amount = time 17. like 12. to 16., with look up table 18. like 12. to 17., with initialization of look up table Violation programm, UNIX Shell script (CAUTION: PLEASE DO NOT EXECUTE!): #!/bin/sh echo -n $'__________\r' for ((i = 0; i < 10; i++)); do echo -n "#" sleep 1 done echo At first, the program reserves the "background" (underscores). These are replaced bit by bit (in a for-loop) with 10 hash-signs ("#"). The actual work of the program is simulated by the pause (sleep 1) line and could be replaced by arbitrary commands. It automatically violates claims 1 and 12, because the described "computer system" is an normal PC (with a UNIX-like shell :) running the program. Claims 2 and 3 are also violated, because the work units are the same as the time passing by (in our example). Further, claims 13, 14, 15 and 16 are violated. CAUTION: This patent is violated by the Federal Government of the Federal Republic of Germany on it's website http://www.treff.bundeswehr.de/data/05_spiele/ There, some games are linked to which display a progress bar on "loading" (e.g. LUNA-Mission). It seems that the animations are optimized for Microsoft Windows, but I guess there are lots of these systems out there. -> 8 violated claims, 1x caught Federal Government Roland Stigge