Lenovo just refreshed to its mobile workstation lineup, which includes the ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 3 laptop and the company’s ThinkPad P series. In total, five ThinkPad mobile workstation models are getting the upgrade to the latest Intel 10th-generation processors and Nvidia graphics, and you’ll be able to pick one up next month in July when they become available.
If you value a balance between productivity and mobility, the ThinkPad X1 Extreme will be the model you’ll want. Boasting a similar silhouette from the iconic ThinkPad X1 Carbon series, the third-generation Extreme model comes with a slightly larger 15.6-inch display in various configurations ranging from a standard FHD panel to a 4K OLED touchscreen model that supports HDR 500 True Black. And at just 0.72-inches thick, the 3.75-pound Extreme looks more like a standard Ultrabook than a workstation, but don’t let that fool you.
Operating system options include Windows 10 Home, Pro, Pro for Workstations, Ubuntu, Red Hat (certified), or Fedora.
2 Weeks with a DeGoogled Phone It has been 2 weeks of GrapheneOS without ANY google services.
The iNet wireless daemon (IWD) software developed by Intel's open-source team have released IWD 1.8.
IWD 1.8 release is the latest version of this Linux wireless daemon developed by Intel as an alternative to WPA_Supplicant and supports integrating with the likes of NetworkManager, systemd's networkd, and Intel's ConnMan software.
Intel and NVIDIA have both published new Windows 10 graphics drivers that support the new experimental capabilities coming to Windows Subsystem for Linux 2 (WSL2) for running Linux GUI applications atop Windows and ultimately for exposing GPU compute capabilities as well inside the WSL2 environment.
Intel's open-source "ANV" Vulkan driver has landed support for the recent VK_EXT_pipeline_creation_cache_control extension.
VK_EXT_pipeline_creation_cache_control was introduced back in March with Vulkan 1.2.135. VK_EXT_pipeline_creation_cache_control exposes information on pipeline creation costs for helping to notify in advance of potentially expensive hazards during Vulkan pipeline creation.
sndcpy is like scrcpy, but for audio. This new tool forwards audio from an Android 10 device to a desktop computer running Linux, Windows or macOS.
You can use sndcpy to enable audio forwarding while mirroring your Android device to your desktop with scrcpy, the low-latency, high performance, free and open source tool to display and control android devices from a desktop. scrcpy ("screen copy") itself doesn't do audio forwarding, and this is where sndcpy ("sound copy") comes in.
Drink More Glurp is currently in the Steam Game Festival and it's as hilarious as their original announcement trailer made it out to be.
If you need a good laugh, the demo that's available for Linux is absolutely brilliant—a proper riot. It's a hot-seat party game set on a distant world where aliens have copied Earth's summer games and got everything slightly wrong. So wrong it's difficult not to laugh as you try to wave your arms around and do whatever challenge it sets from running to throwing and all sorts in between.
I do love a good non-linear action adventure and Alwa's Legacy has everything it needs to be enjoyed. Note: key provided by the developer.
Released today, June 17 after a successful Kickstarter campaign in 2019 from developer Elden Pixels it sort-of acts as a follow-up to the previous game Alwa's Awakening. It's entirely standalone though and can be enjoyed without playing the other. While they stuck with pixel-art to keep it retro, style wise and graphically Alwa's Legacy is a big colourful improvement and a joy to play and it feels very much like a metroidvania.
Attentat 1942 from Charles Games is a World War 2 adventure with an aim to be historically-accurate and give it a different face to what you might expect.
It's a multiple award-winning title too, so great to see it on Linux. Told through the eyes of survivors it's a story of love, friendship and heroism among the horrors of a world conflict. Confront witnesses, experience the everyday life under Nazi rule and uncover the fate of your family in this award-winning game about World War II.
From what the developer told me, they "tried to do something different with the topic that is arguably ubiquitous, showing a humane side to the world conflict and involving professional historians in writing".
Retro-styled block-pushing puzzle adventure Akurra has now been funded on Kickstarter, so it's on the way to Linux. Originally Linux support was going to be a stretch goal, which the developer decided to remove as they decided it wasn't needed which was nice to see.
What is Akurra? Inspired by a few classics like Chip's Challenge, Star Tropics, Sokoban, and Zelda it has you explore different islands and solve various puzzles. Push blocks into holes and over pits, avoid spikes, explore caves, and ride sea turtles in order to find keys, gems, and stars that unlock new paths and friends to aid you as you explore a collection of islands chock-full of puzzles and secrets.
With very pretty graphics and a slick looking vehicle, DRAG is one of the titles you can currently try a demo of during the Steam Game Festival.
From the indie team of two brothers at Orontes Games, DRAG is not your usual simple arcade racer. Using 'deep and challenging driving dynamics', like their 4CPT-technology (4-way contact point traction technology) and every component of the vehicles being simulated (including damage!) it all sounds very promising.
Stadia fans can now jump into The Elder Scrolls Online as it has released on Stadia and it's free to claim on Stadia Pro. It seems it's only for a limited time though and will leave Stadia Pro on July 16 so if you are interested you might want to grab it now.
The Elder Scrolls Online on Stadia has cross-play with Windows/macOS, cross-progression and if you own the expansions on Steam it appears they're picked up on Stadia fine too. That's about where the good parts end though really.
We tested it here and it repeatedly put us into 720p and we had to use the Stadia Plus plugin to force 1080p. Stadia really, badly, needs a built-in resolution picker as I've seen games do this repeatedly with no other way than the external Stadia Plus plugin to help. Their own performance picker doesn't force a resolution, only set the limits of what it will do overall.
Released back in September last year, Deadly Days put a fun spin on mixing together a rogue-lite gameplay loop, a zombie apocalypse and strategic group action. It also just got a lot bigger.
If you've not played it the loop is simple enough: you have a crew that you send to different locations, and then engage in real-time combat and looting before it turns to night and you need to escape back home. Your people level up, gain different weapons and eventually you might find the cure. When you fail (or win) you level up and gain extras through different specializations for future runs.
Like Valve did recently with CS:GO and Dota 2, they've introduced new options in Team Fortress 2 to help deal with community issues and bots. TF2 has sadly been left on life support for some time now, even though it's one of the longest running shooters available on PC.
In Team Fortress 2, this wasn't just the usual problems of having a big community and having some toxic behaviours. They've been under attack by bots spewing racism, sexist, homophobic and all sorts of varied hate-speech that made TF2 a pretty terrible place. It took Valve a while to do anything, as it had been a problem for multiple months.
Remember my mega city built in SimCity 4? An endeavor that took me three years to complete, and resulted in a beautiful region with some 4.3 million citizens? Well, I decided to try something similar in Cities Skylines, a most excellent city building simulation.
If you've been reading my game reviews, then you know that I really like Cities Skylines. Over the past several years, with many an hour spent warming up my house with excess heat from the intense CPU and GPU workloads generated by the ravenous Cities Skylines simulation engine, I set about cracking the game's secrets, including compiling three traffic optimization guides. These should help you create the perfect road grid for your city to flourish and grow. And by grid I mean roundabout. Now, implementing my own advice, I went about building a lovely city, and the result is now here before you.
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Here we go. A beautiful, flourishing, dynamic city, with extra cash, good traffic flow, and continuous demand for growth. I managed to do this without using third-party network mods, as I did in SimCity 4, or any other prop or asset that would alter the default balance of the game. Cities Skylines can sometimes be quite frustrating, especially when cars start doing crazy U-turn maneuvers just to save 2px worth of distance and none of the time, but it is manageable. The flaws in the path finding actually make the game unpredictable and thus even more enjoyable.
I was able to hit the 200K mark after about 20 hours of playing. I'm thinking of starting a fresh city, with an even more optimized layout. My goal is to try to hit 85% network efficiency, remain cash positive, and push through onto an even higher citizen mark. Maybe do this with one of the Boreal maps, and also try some of the custom assets, which might make the city layout even more realistic and fun. All in all, I'm enjoying this a great deal. If you have any asks or suggestions, feel free to email me. And away, me goes, onto me next building adventure!
Last week I implemented Automatic Addition/Removal of Tag Icons. DigiKam provides users with the option to assign Icons to Tags, to allow easy visibility of these tags. For Face Tags in particular, Users may assign a Face associated with that Tag as the Tag Icon. However, in the current implementation, most users don’t make use of the Tag Icon assignment.
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These two processes can be easily automated, so that whenever a new Tag is created (as a consequence of Face Confirmation), then the Face is automatically assigned as the Tag Icon. A similar process can be implemented in the reverse process, that is if the User deletes the last Face associated with the Tag, then the Tag Icon should be deleted.
Premiering today is part one of, "How to Start a Robot Revolution"—a five-part documentary in the Open Source Stories series from Red Hat. The films explore how open source software has created a revolution in robotics. In the mid-2000’s Robot Operating System (ROS) was first designed at the incubator, Willow Garage, as a common platform for building advanced robotic hardware. But in 2014 Willow Garage shut down. Those involved in ROS could have let the project end there, but they didn’t. Thanks to open source software, ROS not only survived, it thrived. In this five-part documentary, we showcase the people behind ROS’s creation and the community that’s turned it into a global phenomenon.
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 comes with a new feature called Application Streams (AppStreams), in which multiple versions of packages are provided, with a known period of support. These modules can be thought of as package groups that represent an application, a set of tools, or runtime languages.
Each of these modules can have different streams, which represent different versions of software, giving the user the option to use whichever version best suits their needs. Each module will also have installation profiles, which help to define a specific use case, and will determine which packages are installed on the system.
Red Hat recently released the first Red Hat JBoss Enterprise Application Platform expansion pack (JBoss EAP XP) version 1.0. This version enables JBoss EAP developers to build Java microservices using Eclipse MicroProfile 3.3 APIs while continuing to also support Jakarta EE 8. This article goes into detail on the nature of this new offering and an easy way to get started.
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You can think of MicroProfile as a minimal standard profile for Java microservices. As with Jakarta EE, MicroProfile implementations across different vendors are fully interoperable. You can read more about MicroProfile in the free e-book Enterprise Java microservices with Eclipse MicroProfile.
By using this expansion pack with Red Hat JBoss Enterprise Application Platform, which is part of Red Hat Runtimes, developers can use JBoss EAP as a MicroProfile-compliant platform. This release simplifies the inherent complexity of developing cloud-native applications on JBoss EAP with MicroProfile. The expansion pack is a separate downloadable distribution that can be applied on top of existing JBoss EAP servers, or you can use the container images available for use with Red Hat OpenShift when deploying JBoss EAP on OpenShift.
The latest update to Red Hat Runtimes features support for Spring Boot 2.2.6, along with the Dekorate project and Spring Reactive. Together, these technologies are a boost for developers building Spring-based applications on the Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform. In this article, I present the highlights of this update.
The Open Liberty 20.0.0.6 release brings new features, updates, and bug fixes. This article introduces the new features in Open Liberty 20.0.0.6, including support for developing “code-first” GraphQL applications, provisioning features from a Maven repository, and using a server configuration to control application startup.
RB5 is part of the RB5 Development Kit, a customizable platform offering support for Linux, Ubuntu, and robotics middleware like Robot Operating System (ROS) 2.0 and pre-integrated drivers for cameras, sensors, and 5G connectivity. It’s compatible with OpenCL, OpenGL, and OpenCV, in addition to depth-sensing cameras like Intel’s RealSense Depth Camera D435i and Panasonic’s TOF Camera. And it comes in flavors packing TDK’s ultrasonic time-of-flight and embedded motor control solutions built to withstand commercial and industrial-grade temperature ranges.
The Apache open source data lake project has matured, as organizations around the world embrace the technology.
Apache Hudi (Hadoop Upserts Deletes and Incrementals) is a data lake project that enables stream data processing on top of Apache Hadoop-compatible cloud storage systems, including Amazon S3.
The project was originally developed at Uber in 2016, became open source in 2017 and entered the Apache Incubator in January 2019. As an open source effort, Hudi has gained adoption by Alibaba, Tencent, Uber and Kyligence, among major tech vendors.
Organizers of the openSUSE + LibreOffice Conference have been slightly adjusted the conference dates from the original dates of Oct. 13 – 16 to the new dates of Oct. 15. - 17.
The new dates are a Thursday through a Saturday. Participants can submit talks for the live conference until July 21 when the Call for Papers is expected to close.
The length of the talks for the conference have also been changed. There will be a 15-minute short talk, a 30-minute normal talk and a 60-minute work group sessions to select. Organizers felt that shortening the talks were necessary to keep attendees engaged during the online conference. The change will also help with the scheduling of breaks, social video sessions and extra segments for Questions and Answers after each talk.
When I was doing a licensing survey in the Fedora ecosystem. I asked a few developers, "What is license according to them?" I got some interesting answers:
"I do not care about the license; it bores me." - a super senior developer says this. (not a very good example to follow)
"You have to fill up the name of a license to make the package in Fedora unless they won't accept the package" (sadly)
"License is something that protects your code." (Ahh finally some optimism)
The answer appeared as a ray of hope to me that yes, there are developers (still) who do care about code ( both their code and law).
We are happy to announce the release of Qt Creator 4.12.3 !
In this release we fixed that when installing OpenSSL for Android via the Android options page, Qt Creator could recursively delete the current working directory without giving the user an informed choice.
Have a look at the change log to find out which other bugs were fixed.
Percepio has launched an open beta test program for the upcoming Tracealyzer version 4.4, which provides much improved support for visualization and analysis of embedded Linux software, packaged in an intuitive and modern user interface. The beta program runs until 1 August 2020, and anyone interested in participating can download Tracealyzer with embedded Linux support from percepio.com now.
A free 45-day evaluation license is included in the program and all participants also qualify for exclusive discounted offers on Tracealyzer licenses up until 1 August.
Experienced developers, much like skilled artisans, rely on a set of tools to help them get their job done effectively and efficiently. However, trying to select the right tools can be intimidating, especially when you have many options to choose from.
Such is the case with Node.js, which is famous for its vibrant community that contributes code and tools for others to use, adding significant value to new generations of apps. However, with so many options out there, it isn't easy to find the most dependable projects to suit your development needs.
To give you some help, I'll share the 10 most useful open source Node.js projects to consider using in your development project.
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Express is one of the most popular Node.js frameworks. It has been around for a while and is known for its simplicity and minimalism. Express offers tremendous value since it makes HTTP requests efficient even when you are working with JavaScript, an out-of-browser and server-side language.
Some of Express' more popular features include handlers to manage HTTP requests with diverse URL routes, rendering-engine integration for inserting template data, and middleware-request processing. Express is also an unopinionated framework, which means you won't have issues executing it because you are not confined to any "right way" of using it to solve a problem.
Today’s blog post is about something that should be simple and apparently it causes trouble: how to declare a qHash overload for a custom datatype. This is necessary when we want to use custom datatypes as keys in a QHash.
These have been difficult times, we hoped for better news, but as time goes by it seems unlikely they will come. Airline companies all around are struggling, there are several border controls in place, and big events are restricted until further notice. As an example, in Portugal all festivals have been canceled until the 30th of September; other smaller events can follow or keep severe distancing rules which drastically reduces the maximum number of possible attendees. Long story short, the current schedule is no longer viable. More information regarding the tickets and sponsors policy on our website.
Now for some good news, DSF allowed us to keep the conference in Porto for another year, so we will host DjangoCon Europe 2021 with as much enthusiasm as we had for this year. Nevertheless, since no one wants to go one year without DjangoCon Europe, we will have the very first Virtual DjangoCon Europe ever, open for everyone free of charge. This will allow us (Django Community) to have some of the needed interaction, while keeping everybody safe.
When we're trying to describe and summarize a sample of data, we probably start by finding the mean (or average), the median, and the mode of the data. These are central tendency measures and are often our first look at a dataset.
In this tutorial, we'll learn how to find or compute the mean, the median, and the mode in Python. We'll first code a Python function for each measure followed by using Python's statistics module to accomplish the same task.
Creating software is hard work. To make your software better, your application needs to keep working even when the unexpected happens. For example, let’s say your application needs to pull information down from the Internet. What happens if the person using your application loses their Internet connectivity?
Another common issue is what to do if the user enters invalid input. Or tries to open a file that your application doesn’t support.
All of these cases can be handled using Python’s built-in exception handling capabilities, which are commonly referred to as the try and except statements.
Python is a wonderful general-purpose programming language, often taught as a first programming language. Twenty years in, multiple books written, and it remains my language of choice. While the language is often said to be straight-forward, configuring Python for development has not been described as such (as documented by xkcd).
A blacklist is a slightly more familiar concept — a list of things that are dangerous and need to be blocked from the machines you're trying to protect. Many antivirus and anti-malware programs are, essentially, blacklists: they include a list of known malicious code, and automatically leap into action when those programs are detected on the protected computer. Blacklists have a fairly obvious disadvantage in that they need to be constantly updated to stay ahead of the latest attacks. By definition, antivirus software can't protect you against a zero-day attack.
In a previous article for the Life in Tech section of FOSSlife, we looked at the duties and responsibilities of a system administrator. This time, we’ll look at the role of site reliability engineer (SRE), which is related to system administration but goes beyond that role and requires a markedly different skillset. We’ll explain what you need to know and provide an overview of the job expectations to help you understand this relatively new career path.
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The site reliability engineering concept originated at Google. The idea is closely related to the principles of DevOps and was conceived as a way to reduce tension between software engineers and product developers (Dev) and sys admins and operations staff (Ops) that can arise at scale due to differing costs, timelines, and perceived priorities. The SRE role can also serve as a bridge between development and operations and is rooted in the approach of applying a software engineering mindset to system administration concepts.
They will try to say "oh it's all governed by US law" but of course section 75 of the Consumer Credit Act makes the card company jointly liable for Bountysource's breach of contract and a UK court will apply UK consumer protection law even to a contract which says it is to be governed by US law - because you can't contract out of consumer protection. So the card company are on the hook and I can use them as a lever.
Ubuntu 20.10 will likely join other Linux distributions in restricting access to dmesg by unprivileged users.
Due to dmesg able to leak kernel addresses and other sensitive information, the plan is to not allow dmesg access for unprivileged users. We previously covered the situation more at length within In 2019, Most Linux Distributions Still Aren't Restricting Dmesg Access.
Just over 7 months ago, I blogged about extrepo, my answer to the "how do you safely install software on Debian without downloading random scripts off the Internet and running them as root" question. I also held a talk during the recent "MiniDebConf Online" that was held, well, online.
The most important part of extrepo is "what can you install through it". If the number of available repositories is too low, there's really no reason to use it. So, I thought, let's look what we have after 7 months...
Security updates have been issued by Arch Linux (dbus and intel-ucode), CentOS (libexif), Debian (vlc), SUSE (xen), and Ubuntu (dbus, libexif, and nss).
In June 2020, two different projects managed to earn a gold badge: the Linux kernel and curl. Both are widely depended on, and yet in many other ways, they are radically different. The Linux kernel has a large number of developers, and as a kernel, it must directly interact with a variety of hardware. Curl has a far smaller set of developers and is a user-level application. They join other projects with gold badges, including the Zephyr kernel and the CII Best Practices badge application itself. Such radically different projects managed to earn a gold badge and thus demonstrated their commitment to security. It also shows that these criteria can be applied even to such fundamentally different programs.
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There are three badge levels: passing, silver, and gold. Each level requires that the OSS project meet a set of criteria; for silver and gold that includes meeting the previous level. Each level requires effort from an OSS project, but the result is reduced risks from vulnerabilities for both projects and the organizations that use that project’s software.
The “passing” level captures what well-run OSS projects typically already do, and has 66 criteria grouped into six categories. For example, the passing level requires that the project publicly state how to report vulnerabilities to the project, that tests are added as functionality is added, and that static analysis is used to analyze software for potential problems. Getting a “passing” badge is an achievement, because while any particular criterion is met by many projects, meeting all the requirements often requires some improvements to any specific project. As of June 14, 2020, there were 3195 participating projects, and 443 had earned a passing badge.
As a black American woman and international development professional, my first thought when I am deployed is: “how do they perceive and treat black people there? Will I be safe?”
Fortunately, I have yet to experience any overt acts of racism while overseas. However, I only needed to engage with one seasoned white male team leader to learn that not all international development professionals share my commitment to social justice.
This was an admittedly naïve perspective for a young black woman entering a career in international development. The senior leaders of international development organisations, as in many other industries, are overwhelmingly white and male.
On June 16, Apple petitioned the Federal Circuit for writ of mandamus on forum non-conveniens. Uniloc has apparently sued Apple in 24 different lawsuits in E.D. Tex. and W.D. Tex. The vast majority of those cases have been transferred to N.D.Cal. (21 of them — transferred by Judges Gilstrap and Yeakel; 2 are stayed but likely to transfer or be dismissed later). This lawsuit is the last active case.
The particular claims of this lawsuit were originally before Judge Yeakel (W.D.Austin), but Uniloc dismissed that case and refiled it before Judge Albright (W.D.Waco). Judge Albright then refused to transfer the case. Note here that Judge Albright is a former patent litigator and is apparently hoping to hear more patent cases, but Waco is not exactly a major industrial-innovation hub. (Aerial view of Waco shown below).
In a recent decision from the United States District Court for the District of Nevada, the court granted a motion to dismiss willful infringement allegations for lacking plausible factual allegations. IP Power v. Westfield , No. 2:19-cv-01878-MMD-NJK (D. Nev. June 4, 2020). This case centers around U.S. Patent No. 6,817,671, which is directed to a collapsible, reclining camp chair with a footrest and cupholders.
The plaintiff sued the defendant after multiple correspondences were exchanged between the parties. In its complaint alleging patent infringement, the plaintiff also asserted that the defendant engaged in conduct rising to the level of willful infringement.
In the latest development in extensive litigation between Shure and ClearOne over audio and conferencing equipment, the District of Delaware rejected a motion to dismiss Shure’s claims over multiple civil procedure grounds, including as compulsory counterclaims to an earlier suit and as failing to be the first to file.
The conflict between Shure and ClearOne began not in the District of Delaware but in the Northern District of Illinois. In 2017, Shure filed a declaratory judgment of noninfringement of ClearOne’s U.S. Patent No. 9,635,186, and ClearOne responded with counterclaims for infringement of the ’186 patent and of U.S. Patent No. 9,813,806. Both patents relate to beamforming microphones in ceiling arrays, an area in which the parties compete. ClearOne got a preliminary injunction for the ’806 patent (but not the ’186 patent), specifically against Shure’s MXA910 product “in its drop-ceiling mounting configuration.” In 2019, ClearOne filed a second infringement suit against Shure in the Northern District of Illinois over U.S. Patent No. 9,264,553, also related to beamforming microphones. Shure got an inter partes review instituted by the Patent Trial and Appeal Board against the ’553 patent, but the PTAB ended up upholding the challenged patent claims.
The District of Kansas held that documents produced by a Canadian attorney working as in-house counsel on U.S. patent infringement matters qualify for attorney-client privilege in a U.S. patent infringement case. Sudenga Indus., Inc. v. Global Industries, Inc., No. 18-2498-DDC (D. Kan. May 15, 2020).
Plaintiff Sudenga Industries sent a cease and desist letter alleging patent infringement to Defendant Global Industries. Defendant is based in Canada, and their General Counsel is licensed in Canada, but not in any U.S. state.
Plaintiff filed a motion to compel documents from Defendant drafted by the Canadian General Counsel regarding the cease and desist letter. Plaintiff argued that the Canadian attorney did not have attorney-client privilege for this U.S. matter. Defendant argued that privilege attached because Canadian privilege would attach in this situation if it involved a Canadian patent and no U.S. case has held that communications from Canadian counsel on U.S. patent matters were not privileged.
While software patents have recently survived Rule 12 motions to dismiss on the pleadings, a lack of an inventive concept doomed a set of software patents as ineligible under 35 U.S.C. ۤ 101. MyMail Ltd. v. ooVoo, LLC, 17-cv-04487 (N.D. Cal. May 7, 2020).
Plaintiff MyMail sued Defendants ooVoo and IAC for infringement of U.S. Patent Nos. 8,275,863 and 9,021,070. After remand by the Federal Circuit vacating the Court’s judgment on the pleadings for lack of claim construction on the term “toolbar,” the parties briefed the claim construction and Defendants refiled motions to dismiss under Rule 12(c). As with Rule 12(b)(6), factual allegations in a complaint are considered true and construed in favor of the movant, and if no dispute of fact remains, the motion to dismiss is granted.
Patent claims directed to a 3D virtual game environment were held ineligible on a Rule 12(c) motion for judgment on the pleadings under 35 U.S.C. €§ 101 and the Alice/Mayo test. Barbaro Technologies, LLC v. Niantic Inc., Case No. 18-cv-02955-RS (N.D. Cal. May 21, 2020). The plaintiff had alleged that defendants infringed claims of two patents, US Patent 7,373,377 and US Patent 8,228,325. Asserted claims of the ’325 patent were held ineligible.
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Under Alice step one, these claims were directed to an abstract idea because they claimed a result, i.e., that “the user interacts with the three-dimensional virtual thematic environment as a simulated real-world interaction.” The ’325 patent specification disclosed “thousands of embodiments of the claimed result, accomplished by a variety of existing technologies,” but offered no technological improvements. The claims here were distinguishable from those in Enfish, LLC v. Microsoft Corp., (Fed. Cir. 2016), Thales Visionix, Inc. v. United States (Fed. Cir. 2017), and Visual Memory, LLC v. NVIDIA Corp. (Fed. Cir. 2017), because the ’325 patent claims recited a result, “simulated real-world interaction ,” rather than being directed to how the result was achieved.
Patent claims directed to presenting a user with a “short list” of “information sources” for selection based on a user location are patent-ineligible under 35 U.S.C. €§ 101 and the Alice/Mayo test. British Telecommunications PLC v. IAC/InterActiveCorp., No. 2019-1917 (Fed. Cir. June 3, 2020) (opinion by Judge Taranto, joined by Judges Dyk and Hughes) (non-precedential). The Federal Circuit panel upheld the district court’s decision, on a Rule 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss, that all claims of U.S. Patent No. 6,397,040 are ineligible under €§ 101. (The underlying lawsuit involves six patents, but only the €§ 101 eligibility of the ’040 patent was at issue in this appeal.)
Patent claims directed to scanning a code pattern for billing information and then processing a bill based on billing information obtained thereby have been held ineligible under 35 U.S.C. ۤ 101 and the Alice/Mayo test. In Coding Technologies, LLC v. Mississippi Power Co., No. 1:19-CV-994-LG-RHW (S.D. Miss. June 4, 2020), the court granted a Rule 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss based on ۤ 101 invalidity of U.S. Patent No. 9,240,008.
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Under Alice step two, the plaintiff tried to argue that whether there was a patent-eligible improvement was a question of fact. But the court said that resolution on a motion to dismiss was permissible where a patent “recites nothing more than basic or generic computer functions and components.” Here, the claims simply recited conventional receiving, analyzing, and processing steps. Barcodes were conventional well before the ’008 patent.
Moreover, the court took the ’008 patent to task for simply reciting what computing tasks were to be performed, without reciting how they were to be performed. The plaintiff’s argument that the claimed invention had an inventive concept in “a system of units” operating “in a non-generic manner” was to no avail. The claims simply used existing technology “to effectuate a long-standing commercial practice.”
