nep.pgelhausen@AMES-VMSB.ARPA (10/04/85)
Someone said that DRI was changing GEM due to Apple making a fuss over the "look & feel" of it coming from the MacIntosh. Anyone know HOW they are going to change it? Will this suit(?) affect the "Intuition" shell that Commodore is using for the Amiga? -Richard Hartman max.hartman@ames-vmsb ------
davecl@orca.UUCP (Dave Clemans) (10/06/85)
Attached is an article from the Antic Online section in Compuserve regarding this subject: dgc **** Start of attached article **** Permission to reprint or excerpt is granted only if the following line appears at the top of the article: ANTIC PUBLISHING INC., COPYRIGHT 1985. REPRINTED BY PERMISSION. ** APPLE GOES AFTER GEM * IBM DESKTOP CHANGES FORCED?? by Gary Yost and Jack Powell 10/1/85 - The San Jose Mercury News today reported that Digital Research, Inc. has agreed, under pressure from Apple Computer, Inc., to alter their GEM Desktop software. According to the Mercury News, Apple approached DRI in June with claims that the GEM software copied the "look and feel" of the Macintosh computer software and violated Apple's visual copyright. Digital Research, the piece goes on, "bowed" to pressure from Apple and has agreed to present a final, changed version of GEM for the IBM by November 15. ANTIC immediately contacted Irving Rappaport, Associate General Counsel for Apple Inc., and the attorney responsible for discussions with DRI. He told us that the situation is based on visual copyrights and not on patents. "Copyright law protects features and expression, which has nothing to do with the underlying concept." Rappaport went on to say, "We've assembled (in the Macintosh) a series of features, and what is protected is what you see on the screen. When you look at the original GEM product, you see a copy of the Mac interface." Rappaport told ANTIC that DRI already made a number of changes and had recently provided Apple with a preliminary altered GEM. He added that Apple considered it "up to DRI to make sufficient changes" by the November 15 deadline. He also said that the situation -- which has not gone into litigation -- was strictly between Apple and DRI. As far as Apple was concerned, it was DRI's obligation to keep Atari informed. "It isn't a question of this feature or that feature. It's the overall appearance of the product. We're going to be looking at Microsoft's Windows and the Commodore Amiga too, and if there is a similar problem we'll address it." Rappaport would not tell ANTIC how Apple felt about the Atari 520ST, except to say they found the nickname "Jackintosh" to be objectionable and that any use of the phrase by Atari themselves may represent a trademark infringement. According to Michael Reichmann of Batteries Included, independent software vendors have been told by DRI to go ahead and ship products now under GEM version 1.2. But they must convert those programs to GEM 1.3 as soon as it becomes available. ANTIC next spoke with Bill Higgs, GEM Marketing Manager at Digital Research. He told us he did not feel that DRI was infringing on Apple's copyright, but DRI's position was that they could not afford the time involved in litigation. "Given the window of opportunity for establishing DRI as a leader in interface technology, we don't want to tie up GEM in the courts for a couple of years." Higgs went into some details of the projected changes. ...But remember, these changes currently affect ONLY the Desktop -- and ONLY the IBM Desktop at this time! Tentatively, the IBM GEM Desktop will boot up with only two windows taking up the entire screen. There can never be more than two Desktop windows. Disk icons must be inside the windows. The "close" button has been redesigned as a rectangle and moved next to the upper right diamond button. There is no sizing of the Desktop windows and there is no trash icon -- files must be deleted from menu selection. There is also no longer any horizontal scrolling. Again, remember that so far this only applies to the IBM, not the Atari. Higgs went on to say that DRI was moving toward a multi-tasking GEM system that would work very well with the new changes. "The basic elements of the visual interface are there. The changes are primarily cosmetic. Functionality is all there." Higgs would not say if DRI had been in communication with Atari. Richard Frick of Atari also had no comment. **** End of attached article ****
Anonymous@inmet.UUCP (10/07/85)
Lets see if Apple tries the same sort of belly-aching toward ATT and the window environment of the PC7300???