Hello HNers,<p>I'm going to (hopefully) be releasing my first commercial software product fairly soon. The lawyers I've talked to have recommended that I file a provisional patent for the software before it becomes publicly available. This is my first foray into the business world, so I don't know what's typical here.<p>I come from an academic background, and I can say that there's nothing publication worthy about this software, which makes me doubt its patentability. It's also quite expensive to get a lawyer to do the filing. Can anyone share some wisdom or experience with this?<p>Perhaps relevant details: I am in the US, working alone, with no outside investors.
Publication-worthy and patentable are two separate things. So, I wouldn't approach from that perspective. Not to over simplify, but software is patentable if it is new, useful, and not obvious given what has been done before.<p>Once you make the software publicly available, you have one year to patent it in the U.S. Other countries don't grant this one-year grace period. So, foreign patent rights depend on filing before you make the software publicly available.<p>I asked my colleague, who is a patent lawyer, his thoughts on this and he recommends just filing a full patent application, not a provisional patent application. A provisional patent application isn't cheap either. And you have to file the full application within a year anyway. So, it's just added costs, deadlines, and administrative hassles.<p>Hope this is helpful.