I was awarded U.S. Patent 5796401, System for designing dynamic layouts adaptable to various display screen sizes and resolutions in August 1998 for concepts and software I developed throughout the 1990s. After developing and using various graphical layout systems, I was interested in making a new system that would be more powerful and more automatic. I code-named the project Powwow and my work on Powwow formed the basis for the patent.
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Object with Connector |
Powwow incorporates an intelligent layout system for drawing and organizing objects. An object is made by dragging to span an area and then releasing the mouse. The resulting object has a set of handles that can be used to resize it or connect it to other objects. Dragging from within a connecting handle displays an arrow on the screen. Releasing on or near another object creates an arrow connecting the two objects. The arrow is sticky and it represents a rule, relating the two objects to each other. As the related objects are moved and resized, the rule persists and makes the layout of the objects intelligent.
The handles, connectors, rules and persistence are all novel inventions in Powwow. Together, they form a system that is powerful, automatic and easy to use. With this technology, users can make layouts that look tight and stay tight as the size of the enclosing screen or window changes. Since rules are made by clicking and dragging, users don't have to deal with forms or numeric measurements. It's all done with mouse gestures and what you see is what you get. Powwow can easily support many types of layouts.
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Intelligent Layout With Resizing |
I started thinking about Powwow in 1990 when I was taking a break from work. After developing a pure layout application with Powwow, I developed three separate versions that each used the technology for different purposes. The first such application was licensed to Apple Computer in the mid 1990s as an object container. Powwow's layout technology was built on the Mac OS as part of OpenDoc. With it users could embed documents, spreadsheets, graphics and other content within Powwow objects. This way intelligent layouts could be made from objects or regions with rich content.
The second application was developed with real-time market news in mind. At the time, I was involved in a partnership with MarketWatch.com. We developed an information service for MarketWatch, aimed at attorneys and co-marketed with the American Bar Association. The service provided legal news, business news and continuing education for attorneys as a series of Web-based news feeds. During the project, I developed a prototype in which the news feeds were embedded in Powwow objects within intelligent layouts.
The third application was aimed directly at Web site development. This Powwow version enabled exporting layouts to Frame-based or CSS-based HTML layouts. This application was fun to develop but it was never shipped commercially.
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Lawyers Communication Network |
In early 1996, I started collaborating with Bill Milks from the law firm of Russo and Hale to work on obtaining a patent for Powwow. We used a unique, lean approach that I've really come to appreciate over the years. I bought an early-generation TV-out board for my PC. I connected the video out from the board to a VHS VCR and connected the sound input from the VCR to a microphone with a clip. I started the recorder and did a Powwow demo on screen with narration.
Bill hired an assistant to transcribe the narration. After some modest editing, that became the text part of the patent application. Several days later, we met and watched the demo together. As we watched it, I took screen shots under Bill's direction. Those screen shots became the exhibits in the application. After several more days of tuning and assembling, and one crashed laptop computer, the application was complete.
Amazingly, the application was accepted completely on the first try and the patent was issued about two years later. The total cost - which I won't name here - was incredibly low, and the process was really painless. Here in Silicon Valley, many people have patents and some of them have more than one to their name. I don't know many people who have patents that were compiled in such a streamlined manner without a significant corporation covering the costs and providing support.
The Powwow patent continues in force today and it's referenced by 26 other patents from major corporations including IBM, Oracle, Microsoft, NEC, Adobe Systems, Autodesk, Xerox, Sun Microsystems and Toshiba.
