Microsoft files to patent virtual page turning

Microsoft has filed for a patent to cover something that Apple’s iBook application does very well–simulating the turning page of a book while reading. According to a TechCrunch article, Microsoft filed the patent application back in 2009 when it was looking at offering a tablet like the iPad called the Courier. It seems Microsoft had a similar thought for the Courier as Apple did with the iPad when it came to using the tablet for reading ebooks. An excerpt from the patent application states:

One or more pages are displayed on a touch display. A page-turning gesture directed to a displayed page is recognized. Responsive to such recognition, a virtual page turn is displayed on the touch display. The virtual page turn actively follows the page-turning gesture. The virtual page turn curls a lifted portion of the page to progressively reveal a back side of the page while progressively revealing a front side of a subsequent page. A lifted portion of the page is given an increased transparency that allows the back side of the page to be viewed through the front side of the page. A page-flipping gesture quickly flips two or more pages.

Now to be clear, Microsoft hasn’t been awarded a chance of getting patent yet and as the article alludes the chances of them patent for simulating the turning of a page virtually may be pretty slim. After all, one would think you can’t patent the animation of a physical action. If so, Disney and Hanna-Barbera are sunk.

Read more at TechCrunch.

Android dual-boot could make Nokia N900 jack of two trades

Two open platforms, of course, creating a vortex of pure, unadulterated openness the likes of which the world has never seen. Hacking is par for the course with Nokia's N900, so it comes as no surprise to see that a motivated individual has managed to get his unit set up in a trick dual-boot configuration with Maemo on internal storage and Android on a separate partition loaded from the microSD card. He says it's "proof of concept" for the moment -- but to steal his words, "its [sic] real and it could be spectacular." We couldn't agree more, and as much as Nokia loves its own code, we can't help but think this precisely the sort of tinkering the N900 was made for.

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