Re: TRM - Morbidity has set in, or not?

From: Frank Hamersley <terabitemightbe_at_bigpond.com>
Date: Mon, 15 May 2006 12:24:54 GMT
Message-ID: <qq_9g.4396$S7.3330@news-server.bigpond.net.au>

x wrote:

> "J M Davitt" <jdavitt_at_aeneas.net> wrote in message
> news:Z_99g.24008$YI5.23255_at_tornado.ohiordc.rr.com...

>> Marshall Spight wrote:

>>> Frank Hamersley wrote:

[..]

>> It *is* much more that a column store storage scheme. I don't know
>> whether you've read a description of TRM, but it features (a) a
>> not-so-surprising ordered collection of observed values, (b) a mildly
>> clever permutation and inverse permutation index, and (c) a very clever
>> "record reconstruction table."

>
> Is this patentable ?

Apparently.

>>> Michael Stonebreaker has a small company that is selling a column
>>> store; it looks quite interesting.
> 

>> If we're talking about the C-Store he was involved with, it does feature
>> a column-wise storage scheme. But, unlike TRM, values will appear in
>> storage just as many times as they appear in the "logical" records
>> being represented. C-Store makes extensive use of compression and,
>> IIRC, is able to performs restricts and selects based on the compressed
>> representations of values. Besides that, one of C-Store's big features
>> is a technique for replicating a data store at different sites and
>> knowing, at all sites, the most recent instant for which all sites have
>> the same values.

> 
> How is compression different from "each value - stored only once" ?
> From what I've heard, compression algorithms are not patentable. :-)
> And yet, compression is fundamental in "computer science".

My layman's understanding is that patents are about method rather than outcomes so if the TRM is unique in that regard its patent will stand.

FWICR you have to pay an annual fee to keep the patent alive - is that still happening?

Cheers, Frank. Received on Mon May 15 2006 - 07:24:54 CDT