Patently Apple

Solar Powered MacBooks May be in our Future

 
This is definitely the year of the environment at Apple. Beyond their initial push, Apple's patents began to reflect their new position. On January 14, we presented Apple's Smart-Home Energy Management Dashboard System and then a week later we reported that Apple Thinks Green Again with Solar Cell Panels for Media Players. Well, Apple is at it again - and this time they're focusing on a light harness that could be an accessory that magnetically attaches to the backside of a future Macbook or could be engineered right into the Macbook using a translucent component. This way when you're outside enjoying the sun at a park or by your tent side, you'll be able to draw power from the sun and cut down on draining your battery. Apple is also considering using solar cells. It may look a bit goofy in the patent, but we all know that the finished product will be slick: That's for sure!

Apple Registers 3 iPhone Icon Designs in China

 
Apple has registered three iPhone icons covering Voice Memos and the Compass in Maps and Compass in China under numbers 0902220.7M001 to 7M003 on March 5, 2010. The icons will be covered until October 2014.

 

Apple Patent May Shed Light on Recent Protective Film Ban

 
Who amongst us knew that Apple had a secret retardation solution for their media players? Surely not I. But there it is in black and white, a granted patent for one of Apple's super secrets of how their display stays so crisp under the most demanding of circumstances. In case you didn't know, Apple's Engineering Team responsible for display and touch technology is as fanatical about their craft as Jonathan Ive is about Industrial Design. Two of the senior display engineer's on this team include Cheng Chen who has a PhD in Liquid crystal physics/optics and is behind Apple's upcoming iPad as is John Zhong who won an honorary award in 2009 from The Society for Information Display (SID) for his exceptional contributions to display technology. Today's granted patent presents us with a basic overview of this team's use of retardation film on media displays so that we could continue to enjoy crisp imagery even when we're wearing sunglasses. At the end of the day, Apple's granted patent may even provide us with a little reasoning behind Apple's recent move to ban protective screen film from the Apple Store.

Apple Wins iMac Touch Related Patent – a.k.a. the iKey Patent

 
The US Patent and Trademark Office officially published a series of 7 newly granted patents for Apple Inc. today. One of these patents deserves to stand out all by itself: A patent that points to signet based login system for an iMac with a touchscreen. Some have called it the iKey patent.

Apple Reveals 3D-Like UI for Social Networking App & More

In the second half of 2007 Apple had successfully integrated Cover Flow into their iPhone and iPod touch handhelds. That provided users with the ability to view and flip through their collection of iTunes album covers in a quick and easy way using a very unique 3D-like user interface. Of course that was the original intent for the app that was originally developed by Steel Skies - prior to Apple's acquisition. With a year's worth of experience with Cover Flow on handhelds under their belt, it appears that Apple's R&D went right to work on expanding the utilization of such a feature into other types of applications. Apple's exemplary example displayed in today's patent once again points to a social networking application. However, it's currently unclear whether Apple is planning to add this methodology to their iGroups project or simply make this technology available to third party iPhone developers in general. Time will tell.