Microsoft banned from selling Word

    The Texas U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas set aside 60 days for Microsoft to comply with a regulation prohibiting Microsoft from selling Word applications in the United States that allowed users to create personalized XML documents.

    The ruling was issued in response to a patent infringement lawsuit filed by i4i. The most common versions of Word on the market today are Word 2003 and Word 2007, since both of them allow you to create personalized XML documents.

    Microsoft said they intend to file an appeal. However, even if the court order comes into force, Microsoft may cut back on Word functionality for the time being.

    According to Michael Cherry, an analyst with the company’s development department, a court order is unlikely to have any tangible impact on anyone, at least in the near future.

    At the same time, i4i spokeswoman Loudon Owen explained that if the court order comes into force, those who use the custom XML function in Word will have to find other ways to create templates. “I hope they turn to us, because it is we who support custom XML,” he said.

    According to Owen, the court also ruled that Microsoft would pay another forty million dollars for intentional infringement of the patent and more than thirty-seven as a percentage of the period until the court decision. Given the fact that this year, before the ban on the sale of Word, the court already ordered Microsoft to pay i4i 200 million, the total amount of fines reaches $ 290 million.

    i4i accused Microsoft of knowingly violating patent laws in March 2007. This company received a patent for a method of reading XML files back in 1998.

    via pcworld.com

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