[throwawaykf03]

The Dock patent is specifically on the dynamic resizing and repositioning of icons when moused over. A plain collection of icons won't infringe this patent.

The second patent is a design patent, which means you'd have to have a menu exactly like that to infringe.

Funnily enough, one of the icons in the figures in the first patent is for Internet Explorer. I think I also spied one for Word.

[thrillgore]

I actually never understood the usability behind growing/shrinking the Dock icons. Good icons have enough of a profile to be distinguishable when they're small.

[rsynnott]

It's from 1999; at that time, Apple shipped IE.

[throwawaykf03]

Yep, just seems funny today.