The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Apr. 08, 1997
Filed:
May. 05, 1995
Alan W Lillich, Los Gatos, CA (US);
Jeffrey R Cobb, Sunnyvale, CA (US);
Erik L Eidt, Campbell, CA (US);
Wayne N Meretsky, Los Alto, CA (US);
Apple Computer, Inc., Cupertino, CA (US);
Abstract
The present invention discloses a variety of methods and apparatus for providing patches within a computer operating system. A patch structure in accordance with one embodiment of the present invention includes a patch block which serves to link the patch structure into a patch chain, and a patch which contains the desired functionality of the patch structure. The patch chain includes a root patch structure and a final patch structure. The root patch structure has a root patch block and a given function which has the root functionality. One aspect of the present invention teaches a method for integrating patches into a computer operating system including the steps of obtaining a new patch to be associated with a patch chain for the given function, determining whether a patch chain is already created in the operating system for the given function and creating a root patch block pointing to the given function as the start of a new patch chain if a patch chain has not already been created for the given function, creating a new patch block for the new patch, and inserting data into the new patch block to cause the new patch block to point to the new patch.