I say conflation of definitions because I believe you are attributing to the
software the honor that belongs to the hardware!
In your example of
software routing, I'd say the potentially patented item1 is the
hardware in both cases that you define. Never the software!
To allow the
patenting of specific software as applied to hardware is the equivalent of
allowing the patenting of entering a specific math formula as applied to a
calculator!
If the hardware was designed such that you can apply a
software solution in order to extend your ports: it's still the hardware change
that made the allowance! The previous hardware had a limitation that was broken
with the new hardware!
You can not use software - ever - to do something
the hardware simply was not designed to do. The hardware totally defines the
limitations that you can apply to software as attached to said hardware.
You
can use software to draw a picture on your current standard desktop computer
that shows a computer walking away from the desk.
But you will never,
ever, ever be able to design your software on your current standard desktop
computer to actually cause that computer itself to sprout legs and walk away!
Ever!
You can use software to draw a picture on your current standard
desktop of the making of a cup of hot coffee complete with steam!
But
you will never, ever - ever - be able to use software to create a physical cup
of coffee with said hardware so that you can actually smell the coffee and drink
the coffee!
The device that makes it possible for one to provide such a
software solution is the potentially patentable hardware. The software itself
is just "using the device for exactly what it was built for and no
more".
There's no difference in applying that software to make use of
additional ports once the hardware was built to allow that already-known task
then it is to applying a math formula to a calculator!
And a patent on
the "process" of "enter 2+2= into the device and read the display to find out
the result" should never - ever - be patentable subject matter.
The very
act is the reverse of the exchange that is supposed to exist for a
patent:
It takes knowledge already disseminated to the public and wraps it
into a Monopoly grant!
The exchange is supposed to be:
Disseminating
knowledge to the public that the public doesn't have in exchange for a temporary
Monopoly grant!
1: You consider the idea to have
software ports novel. I consider the idea to have software ports obvious once
the hardware was adapted to allow for a concept already known!
To take
that a step further, I'd say once the public learned you can take any
informational process and automate it via the means of a computer - any
application of software (even on physical processes yet to come where the
designers realize they're just processing information) are blindingly
obvious!
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