LiteSwitchX. It's an app that many Mac users have used, in one form or another, since the days of Mac OS 8.x. LiteSwitchX provides application switching from the keyboard through a command-tab key combo. While such switching has long been built into the Mac OS, LiteSwitchX includes a graphic pop-up menu that brings up your running apps, making it easier to see what you are switching.

The feature first showed up in GoMac, a Classic Mac OS utility that Proteron sold to Power On Software in February of 1999. The application switching feature was eventually made into a separate app called LiteSwitch by Proteron. Like GoMac itself, a utility that gave Classic Mac OS a Windows-like task bar, LiteSwitch's application switching borrowed from the application switcher included in Windows.

In Mac OS X, LiteSwitchX brought that idea into the world of Aqua. While Apple offered command-tab switching through the Dock, LiteSwitchX offered the Classic Mac app's idea of having an Aquafied pop-up window that only included running apps, again making it easier and quicker to know what you were switching.

On a smaller note, LiteSwitchX also allowed users to switch backwards through the list with just command-shift. Apple's backward switching requires command-tab-shift. LiteSwitchX's command-shift keyboard combo is considered much easier, and faster, by many Mac OS X users.

Enter Panther. Apple's newest version of Mac OS X includes a pop-up application switching window that is just like LiteSwitchX. The only problem, according to an "open memo" to Apple and Steve Jobs that Proteron has published, is that Apple has not offered any attribution, let alone compensation, to Proteron. The open letter, in full, from Proteron:

Dear Steve et al at Apple Computer,

Congratulations on the recent hardware announcements and release of Panther. Apple continues to innovate in the world of personal computers. Thanks for all the hard work. Our lives are a bit better and brighter for your efforts.

There is, however, one issue I must raise. It is regarding a specific feature introduced in Panther. As you are aware, keyboard application switching is significantly improved. What is disappointing is that this "improvement" is a near pixel duplication of a Proteron product, LiteSwitch X. And despite the obvious similarities, Proteron has received no recognition or credit.

This memo is written for two reasons. First, to request that Apple officially recognize that LiteSwitch X played a role in the formation of Panther's switcher. For tens of thousands of users the feature has existed since May 2002. A developer at Proteron first conceived of it. Proteron developed and published it. Now Apple has made it their own, an "Apple innovation", without recognizing Proteron.

This memo is also written to publicly highlight your behavior and request more of an explanation. What happened with LiteSwitch X is a repeat of recent Apple history, ala Sherlock 3 and Karelia's Watson. You have again absorbed a third-pary innovation into the OS without crediting the original authors. Why not give credit to your developers? Does Apple lose anything? Does it hurt Apple or the Mac OS to recognize that a someone's ideas are so good they belong in the Mac's core feature set? Is there any harm in hailing the achievements of the "little guy"?

We're flattered by the imitation. And we don't blame you for incorporating great features into the OS - it is good for Mac users everywhere. But it is definitely going to hurt our bottom-line during hard times. And we don't even get credit for our work.

I feel that what Apple has done by incorporating third party features into the Mac OS without recognition is both disappointing and dishonest. I invite you to change your approach. There is no shame in recognizing quality work whenever and wherever it appears, especially when it is coming from within the Mac community. We love what you've done with Panther. We love developing for the Mac. As you continue to innovate, please recognize those who have helped you. It's a basic courtesy: give credit where credit is due.

Sincerely,

Samuel Caughron et. al.
Proteron LLC

You can find the open memo at Proteron's Web site.

This is a tough one. First of all, Apple has pulled the rug out from under the feet of Proteron with the application switcher in Panther. From my testing, the main thing Proteron is now offering that Apple is not is the ability to do backward switching without using the tab key. While that one function may be worth it to those used to doing it the proper way, this new feature in Panther will hurt Proteron, a Mac developer that has been making great Mac apps for many years.

Apple has done this sort of thing in the past, as noted in the open memo, and the company went so far as to criticize a third-party peripheral, Orange Micro's iBot, during this year's World Wide Developer Conference when introducing the iSight. From our vantage point in the audience, this came as somewhat of a surprise to the Orange Micro developers who were also in the audience.

Not mentioned by Proteron is iTunes, which was developed by the developers of Casady & Greene's SoundJam. Casady & Greene told TMO at the time that Apple had not purchased the product, and that they hadn't received any compensation or other arrangements for having their developers hired out from under them. Apple has never commented on that issue.

On the less-controversial side of things, Apple has also bought products like Macromedia's Final Cut in order to directly compete with Adobe's Premiere, which has now been canceled on the Mac. Most users agree that this was no big loss, but it made Adobe tense enough to then insult the Mac's processing power.

Microsoft canceled development of Internet Explorer, a product that had actually seen little development in years, and cited Apple's Safari Web browser as the reason. Again, few miss IE, though many fear the Mac platform needs it.

In other words, Apple has a history now of targeting technologies, software, and products that it thinks need to be controlled or offered by Apple. That history also shows that the company isn't afraid to step on its own developers' toes in the process.

So what's the deal with LiteSwitchX? Clearly Apple took Proteron's idea and ran with it. It is inconceivable, though possible, that everyone involved with the development of Panther's application switching interface was ignorant of LiteSwitchX's existence. The problem is, however, that LiteSwitch itself was originally developed from a Microsoft idea. So where's the original inspiration? Were both companies inspired by the creative folks in Redmond? For all I know, Microsoft may also have had inspiration from some other source.

My gut instinct is that LiteSwitch or LiteSwitchX was the inspiration, but the real question was asked by Proteron: Would it hurt Apple to make arrangements with third party developers who have an idea Apple deems worthy of assimilating? I'll play devil's advocate, too: Does it matter? This is merely business, after all.

What are your thoughts?