A few years ago there were some news headlines about that Microsoft is getting royalty fee from Android phones manufactures, because of some Android user interface basic concepts, that were patented by Microsoft. Unfortunately, none of them explain exactly which specific UI elements or concepts was the reason:
Why Microsoft Makes $5 to $15 From Every Android Device Sold
Currently, I am developing my own UI library for Windows. My library provides mechanisms for Windows-developers to create beautiful GUI programs, and I want to sell it in the future. The main advantage of my UI library is that it does not use any of the standard Windows controls, because I am rewriting it on my own.
Although most of UI controls are initially "clean" and need to be set up, customized, some controls already have predefined behavior and the way it displayed, for example - text input field. When developer creates it, it already has an ability to select text via mouse, move caret using keyboard.
The fact that is worrying me, is that logic, that experience exists in existing controls. Stuff like caret, selecting text using a mouse, scrollbars, etc. But in the other hand I am going to distribute it only for Windows.
Can those be patented by Microsoft or someone else? Can Microsoft suing me, if I will sell GUI library that imitating their patented conceptions only for Windows platform?
Update
I am asking specifically about text selection using mouse.
patent text selection mouse
).The main advantage of my UI library is that it does not use any of the standard Windows controls, because I am rewriting it on my own.
This is actually a disadvantage. For instance, this is likely to prevent people from using screen readers with your software, since they won't know about it (unless you put in extra work to wire that up).