<div id="RTEContent"> "STYMA, ROBERT E (ROBERT)" <stymar@lucent.com> wrote:<blockquote class="replbq" style="border-left: 2px solid rgb(16, 16, 255); margin-left: 5px; padding-left: 5px;"> > Robert P. J. Day: > > i'm not sure i agree. as a previous poster mentioned, a patent on > > the long names featurs of FAT has the potential to impact a lot of > > handheld/digital/personal devices -- PDAs, digital cameras, etc. > > Microsoft hoping to rake in more revenue from appliances using *their* > technology, more than trying to prevent people using it... > > Wouldn't such devices be better off with something like UDF, instead > though? > This raises the question as to exactly what would have to be licensed. Since the format of a FAT file system has long been documented would you need a license to read at FAT file system, write a FAT file system, create a FAT file sy! stem, or just have the file system on a device? </blockquote>Whatever happened to Caldera's Canopy Group's lawsuit against MS after they acquired the rights to Digital's DrDOS? There was alot of restraint of trade issues raised... CP/M used 8.3 file names too... way before DOS. <cackles> I remember, I used CP/M, I'm that old and crusty. <cackles> Ric </div> <hr size=1>Yahoo! Photos Ring in the New Year with <a href="http://us.rd.yahoo.com/mail_us/taglines/photos/*http://pa.yahoo.com/*http://us.rd.yahoo.com/mail_us/taglines/photos/evt=38087/*http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph//page?.file=calendar_splash.html&.dir=">Photo Calendars</a>. Add photos, events, holidays, whatever.