isearch, LEAP and patents was: Re: Could Emacs be rewritten in Python?

[Rob Mayoff]

Alexander Schmolck <a.schmolck at gmx.net> wrote in message news:<yfs1y0el9xc.fsf_-_ at black132.ex.ac.uk>...
> Maybe someone on comp.emacs can fill us in on isearch's origins and whether
> raskin holds any patents that are relevant to emacs (he certainly seems to
> either hold or have applied for patents concerning THE[1] and from what I gather
> from his webpage pretty much everything that would seem original enough to get
> patented is present in emacs)?

The LEAP patent (US patent 5,019,806) does not claim general
incremental search.  It claims an incremental search mechanism where
one key enables a forward search mode while the key is pressed, and a
second key enables a backward search mode while the second key is
pressed.  In other words, it claims quasi-modal incremental search. 
Emacs doesn't have that.