Patent Number 5359724 – Method and Apparatus for storing and retrieving Multi-dimensional data in Computer memory

I love history. I guess there is something about the dusty stories that strikes a chord with me somewhere. I love reading stories on how internet came into existence, how Enigma was cracked and the famous browser wars. The stories are made interesting because at the back you have people like us who made it possible. And people are driven by passion and the traits that define their personality. 

On March 30, 1992, a patent was filed bearing application number 860443 by Robert J Earle. It was titled “Method and apparatus for storing and retrieving multi-dimensional data in computer memory”. The assignee for the patent was a company based in Santa Clara, California called Arbor Software Corporation. The patent was granted on October 25, 1994. This was the patent for Hyperion Essbase as we knew it then.

Here is the link where you can check out the patent.

http://www.google.co.in/patents/US5359724

The good thing about the patent is that if you check the section about the other publications that the author has referred to you will see a book called as “The Art of Computer Programming” by Donald E. Knuth. Any computer science graduate has this book as a first introduction into the world of computer programming. This book has not changed a lot in all these years and is a wonderful book to refer to. So somewhere, although in a different time and place, Mr. Earle and I have both turned the same pages of the book and took inspiration. 

The patent is a wonderful read and I am reading all of the associated patents to basically get in touch with a product that I have worked with for almost five years. Will keep you posted on the same.