Company sues Apple over Tiger’s use of tabs
Posted by Dennis Sellers 
Apr 21, 2007 at 4:38pm
Intellectual property agency IP Innovation LLC and its parent Technology Licensing Corporation have filed a lawsuit against Apple Inc., alleging that Mac OS X 10.4 (“Tiger”) treads on an interface patent that affects the operating system’s nearly universal use of tabs, according to an AppleInsider report.
The lawsuit is an intellectual property-patent infringement suit. The presiding judge is Leonard Davis of the Texas Eastern District Court.
The lawsuit was filed April 18th in a US district court in Marshall, Texas, and claims that Apple has engaged in “willful and deliberate” infringement of a computer control patent by selling its current Tiger operating system. IP Innovation is demanding a jury trial and asks for reparations for perceived damages which “exceed $20 million,” according to the suit. It also seeks an injunction that would prevent the California-based defendant from infringing on the patent, essentially blocking Apple from continuing to sell its current edition of Mac OS X and any future editions that might draw on the supposed infringements.
J. Scott Anderson Says:
Tabs are everywhere. It has been a while, but I seem to remember tab interfaces as far back as various notebook-like applications in OS 8 and 9. I would love to see how they claim a patent on them. Think I’ll take a look at the court documents and the patent.
Posted on April 22, 2007
JuggerNaut Says:
Man, have they totally ignored Microsoft Windows and the tabbed mess that are property windows??!
Posted on April 23, 2007
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Contributor
Dennis Sellers
Dennis has been a newspaper editor/reporter (seven years) and teacher (seven years). He has over 4,000 magazine, newspaper and online articles to his credit. He has also covered the Mac and tech industries for over a decade for such online publications as MacCentral, MacMinute and now MacsimumNews.
Deocliciano Okssipin Vieira Says:
Would like to know how this ends.
... demanding a jury?
Posted on April 22, 2007