Novell originally filed the suit claiming that Microsoft purposely suppressed and sabotaged WordPerfect, a word processing platform developed by Novell, in order to consolidate users to Microsoft Word. Consequently, Novell claims they suffered severe financial loss due to Microsoft’s tampering. Alternately, Microsoft has cited Novell’s own mismanagement for the decline of WordPerfect’s popularity and usability.

From Network World:

In a filing to U.S. federal judge J. Frederick Motz, Microsoft’s lawyer said Monday that the company intends to renew its motion for judgment as a matter of law under Rule 50 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.

In ruling on the renewed motion, under Rule 50 the court may allow judgment on the verdict if the jury returned a verdict, order a new trial, or direct the entry.

Incredibly, some jurors were reported to be in tears after being dismissed. Attorneys on both sides admitted to being disappointed as they were hopeful to get some kind of verdict after all of this time.

Oddly, the jury was hung at an 11-1 decision against Microsoft, which causes me to fondly recall all of those episodes of The Sopranos where the mob dudes would terrorize one poor juror into holding out from agreeing on a verdict. Members of the Sopranos mob family would intimidate and threaten one vulnerable juror in order to coerce them into dissenting from the otherwise unanimous jurors’ decision against the accused gangster. Without an agreement among jurors, the case ends in mistrial and the mobster walks free.

But who knows if Microsoft actually has that kind of menacing clout; it all just sounds very odd.

The actual request to dismiss the case is expected to be filed early next year.

Novell made its closing arguments in the trial yesterday, reiterating their claim that Microsoft deliberately sabotaged WordPerfect by tampering with programmer’s access to extensions and thus making it impossible for WordPerfect to run properly on Windows. Novell has argued that their precipitous decline of shares in the word-processing market, falling from 50% in 1990 to a lowly 10% in 1996, is a direct result of Microsoft suppressing WordPerfect’s access and successful operation.

Microsoft has countered Novell’s claims in press releases, stating that the lack of quality in WordPerfect was due to Novell’s “own mismanagement and poor business decisions.” Microsoft defends itself further by arguing that, as of 1994, WordPerfect had already begun to decline in popularity and value and again places that blame on Novell, who they say had hoped to deprive “Windows of a key application [and] limit the success of Windows.”

Jurors are scheduled to begin deliberating tomorrow if not later today.

I barely remember even using WordPerfect in my youth, but should Microsoft be found liable for the lack of availability of WordPerfect, I will then have to wonder how many times in my past I wouldn’t have gritted the words, “I hate Microsoft Word,” or, “I hate OpenOffice,” because I could’ve been using WordPerfect instead.

Then again, if it was still around, it’s just as likely I would’ve been muttering, “I hate WordPerfect,” too. Some people. They’re never satisfied.

Microsoft lost the case to a tune of $290 million. Reuters reports:

  The court also affirmed an injunction that prevents Microsoft from selling versions of its Word program which contain the offending software, set to take effect January 11, 2010. Older versions of Word are not affected.

The disputed patent feature relates to the use of XML, or extensible markup language, used for manipulating text, in the 2007 versions of Word. Microsoft described it on Tuesday as a "little-used feature".

"We couldn’t be more pleased with the ruling from the appeals court which upheld the lower court’s decision in its entirety," said Loudon Owen, Chairman of i4i. "This is both a vindication for i4i and a war cry for talented inventors whose patents are infringed."

"The same guts and integrity that are needed to invent and go against the herd, are at the heart of success in patent litigation against a behemoth like Microsoft," added Owen. "Congratulations to our entire team who provided such dynamic leadership, courage and tenacity!"

The abstract for the patent in question reads:

  A system and method for the separate manipulation of the architecture and content of a document, particularly for data representation and transformations. The system, for use by computer software developers, removes dependency on document encoding technology. A map of metacodes found in the document is produced and provided and stored separately from the document. The map indicates the location and addresses of metacodes in the document. The system allows of multiple views of the same content, the ability to work solely on structure and solely on content, storage efficiency of multiple versions and efficiency of operation.

The entire thing can be read here.

"This ruling is clear and convincing evidence that our case was just and right, and that Microsoft wilfully infringed our patent," said Michel Vulpe, founder and co-inventor of i4i. "i4i is especially pleased with the court’s decision to uphold the injunction, an important step in protecting the property rights of small inventors. We will continue to fully and vigorously enforce our rights and we invite all potential customers interested in custom xml to contact us."

Back when Microsoft first lost the case, the company issued a statement saying, ""We are disappointed by the court’s ruling. We believe the evidence clearly demonstrated that we do not infringe and that the i4i patent is invalid. We will appeal the verdict."

It appears that disappointment will not be going away.

Related Articles:

> Microsoft Hit With Patent Infringement

> Microsoft Granted Motion to stay Word Injunction

Original Article: A Texas judge has reportedly ruled that Microsoft cannot sell any version of Word in the US that can open .XML, .DOCX or DOCM files (XML files) containing custom XML. Seattlepi’s Microsoft Blog points to an announcement by the plaintiff, i4i.

In May, i4i in Toronto got $200 million from Microsoft, when a federal jury found that Microsoft infringed on the company’s patent. That patent is 11 years old. The abstract reads:

A system and method for the separate manipulation of the architecture and content of a document, particularly for data representation and transformations. The system, for use by computer software developers, removes dependency on document encoding technology. A map of metacodes found in the document is produced and provided and stored separately from the document. The map indicates the location and addresses of metacodes in the document. The system allows of multiple views of the same content, the ability to work solely on structure and solely on content, storage efficiency of multiple versions and efficiency of operation.

The entire thing can be read here.

"We are disappointed by the court’s ruling," a Microsoft spokesman is quoted as saying in a statement. "We believe the evidence clearly demonstrated that we do not infringe and that the i4i patent is invalid. We will appeal the verdict."

Popular belief is that Microsoft will probably overcome this one. Microsoft not selling Word in the US? That will be the day.

The company’s announcement follows yesterday’s unveiling of its cloud-based Web apps operating platform, Windows Azure, and both are “part of a strategic companywide shift toward embracing web-based solutions.”

Office Web will allow access to the lighter versions of the classic Office programs via a Web browser. Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Safari compatible, no word has been released yet about Google Chrome. Given that Office Web is HTML and AJAX based, one imagines Chrome shouldn’t haven’t issues.

Historically, Microsoft has been slow to embrace Web-based applications. After all, its bread has been buttered with widespread desktop machine adoption. Capossela says times have changed.

“Customers’ requirements have changed, as have their expectations of technology. While Office is synonymous with desktop productivity, the idea of “desktop” has changed from a PC-centric notion to one in which people are empowered on the PC, on the phone, and with a browser. Our customers don’t use one device, but rather several.”

Office Web will be accessible via Office Live, with both ad-supported and subscription options. Business users will get access via hosted subscriptions and existing volume licensing agreements.”
 

The day known as Patch Tuesday rides again on May 13th, when Microsoft issues whatever current patches they have ready to address flaws in the components of their widely used operating system and other programs.

An Advance Bulletin for this month’s edition cited three upcoming Critical fixes to be released next Tuesday. Along with Word, Microsoft Publisher, and the Jet database engine receiving Critical updates, Microsoft’s various security programs have a Moderate-rated flaw that could result in a denial of service condition.

Critical flaws pose the most headaches for system administrators. If exploited, this class of vulnerabilities could leave a system open to remote code execution. Since such code execution likely would be malicious, admins tend to want these holes closed as fast as possible.

It’s even more important today to apply patches as quickly as possible after they have been released. Criminals see the same bulletins and some try to create exploits against those flaws, in the hopes of hitting a vulnerable system before it has a patch applied to closed the hole.

The time frame for exploit creation gets smaller and smaller. With profit being a huge motivation for co-opting a system, to possibly steal valuable login credentials to various websites, the existing patch model used by Microsoft and other software companies may need to change to ensure the security of their products and their customers.

Microsoft cited limited, targeted attacks affecting the vulnerability in Jet Database Engine, saying the exploits are not widespread. Users of Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 2, Windows Vista, and Windows Vista Service Pack 1 are not vulnerable to the buffer overrun being attacked, Bill Sisk said on the Microsoft Security Response Center blog.

“Our initial investigation has shown that this vulnerability affects customers using Microsoft Word 2000 Service Pack 3, Microsoft Word 2002 Service Pack 3, Microsoft Word 2003 Service Pack 2, Microsoft Word 2003 Service Pack 3, Microsoft Word 2007 and Microsoft Word 2007 Service Pack 1 on Microsoft Windows 2000, Windows XP, or Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1,” said Sisk.

In the formal advisory about the Jet issue, Microsoft noted the attack requires user interaction:

Current attacks require customers to take multiple steps in order to be successful; we believe the risk to be limited.

In a Web-based attack scenario, an attacker would have to host a Web site that contains a specially crafted Word file that is used to attempt to exploit this vulnerability. In addition, compromised Web sites and Web sites that accept or host user-provided content could contain specially crafted content that could exploit this vulnerability.

An attacker would have no way to force users to visit these Web sites. Instead, an attacker would have to persuade users to visit the Web site, typically by getting them to click a link in an e-mail message or Instant Messenger message that takes users to the attacker’s site.

As we regularly suggest at SecurityProNews, avoid the temptation to visit links or open files delivered in email from unknown or suspicious senders. Microsoft, meanwhile, urges people to report security issues to it directly, rather than publicizing them and laying the groundwork for zero-day exploits.