Someone needs to give those @$$h073 lawyers a cold bath.

The patent is effective Aug. 3, 1999. So, I guess they never saw this prior art, tho everyone working in the field at the time used these references:

Netscape JavaScript Guide. Look at the bottom of the navigation frame (you know, the patent-infringing one ;-) for the notice "Copyright © 1995-1996 Netscape Communications Corporation"

http://wp.netscape.com/eng/mozilla/3.0/handbook/javascript/index.html

HTML reference. At the top of the index page appears this notice: "...This book was posted on 11/19/97. This tag reference replaces the previous HTML Reference Guide.

http://developer.netscape.com/docs/manuals/htmlguid/index.html Last updated: 1/26/98."

These tools are in the same form they were in when I used them in the mid-90s. The patent wants to cover functionality that's specifically what the tag was designed to do.

The patent can be found at http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=/netahtml/srchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=5,933,841.WKU.&OS=PN/5,933,841&RS=PN/5,933,841

I don't see the section listing prior art, nor can I view the images :-(