Comments on: La règle de Tronche de distinction du logiciel /blog/2006/07/14/tronches-software-separability-criterion/ Mes pensées afin que je ne les oublie pas... Wed, 24 Feb 2010 23:11:35 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 hourly 1 By: Frederik Hertzum /blog/2006/07/14/tronches-software-separability-criterion/comment-page-1/#comment-910 Frederik Hertzum Sat, 11 Feb 2012 23:06:00 +0000 http://tronche.com/blog/2006/07/14/tronches-software-separability-criterion/#comment-910 Your test still holds some problems -- it's good and will likely be enough for most cases. I propose instead that a different approach can be taken. It is more complex, but I don't think you can make a good seperation between patentable and non-patentable machines without at least some complexity. First of all you have to acknowledge that a program (software) is a machine. it is not all that different from any other machine, except that the reality it exists in is different and thus it plays by different rules. Machines that are not software, are hardware and can not be used in hardware. Machines that are not hardware are software and can not be used without hardware. Now, to test if a machine is patentable you simple ask if it requires hardware. If it does, then (since it's software), it's non-patentable. Any piece of hardware that requires another piece of hardware to do it's thing is still patentable, because it doesn't really require hardware to do anything -- it just requires hardware to do the one (or more) right thing(s): You should note that human minds are machines according to this context, and so anything that can be passed as software should also fit in our mind (since the mind can solve any turing problem it should hold true for any real software) -- so it should be enough to be able to solve a given problem in our minds to prove that a machine is not patentable. Your test still holds some problems — it’s good and will likely be enough for most cases. I propose instead that a different approach can be taken. It is more complex, but I don’t think you can make a good seperation between patentable and non-patentable machines without at least some complexity.

First of all you have to acknowledge that a program (software) is a machine. it is not all that different from any other machine, except that the reality it exists in is different and thus it plays by different rules.

Machines that are not software, are hardware and can not be used in hardware. Machines that are not hardware are software and can not be used without hardware.

Now, to test if a machine is patentable you simple ask if it requires hardware. If it does, then (since it’s software), it’s non-patentable. Any piece of hardware that requires another piece of hardware to do it’s thing is still patentable, because it doesn’t really require hardware to do anything — it just requires hardware to do the one (or more) right thing(s):

You should note that human minds are machines according to this context, and so anything that can be passed as software should also fit in our mind (since the mind can solve any turing problem it should hold true for any real software) — so it should be enough to be able to solve a given problem in our minds to prove that a machine is not patentable.

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