[Patents] Re: [Patents] Re: [Patents] re :Answer to requests sent to french Economic

[Jean-Paul Smets jp@smets.com]

Gregory Aharonian wrote:

> These discussions about defining "software" are fairly pointless,
> especially when the politicans are doing the talking.

In your case, I would give the following analysis
        - the digital circuit is patentable as such if it has an industrial 
application
        - the VHDL description is not patentable as such because it does not
fall in the category of inventions and is rather a description of the
patented process
        - any industrial process involving the use of the VHDL description may
eventually be patentable

Again this shows the difference between a patent on a process involving
software and a patent on a program as such.

The key idea is that
        - a program as such (not running in any computer device) can only be
considered as one possible description of a patented process, not the
process it self
        - a program running in a computer device can be considered as an
instanciation of the patented process, therefore falling under the patent

I do not feel it is pointless, espcially if you consider that patents on
programs as such allow in the US to get patents for social practices
while patents on processes involving software do not in Europe. 

Who wants patents on a new voting system or on a new method to manage
companies ?

JPS.