The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office officially published a series of 26 newly granted patents for Apple Inc. today. In this particular report we cover the Apple Watch magnetic mechanism and the Mac Pro design patent. We wrap up this week's granted patent report with our traditional listing of the remaining granted patents that were issued to Apple today.

Granted Patent: The Magnetic Mechanism for Apple Watch

Apple's newly granted patent covers 15 patent claims relating to the magnetic actuated attachment mechanisms for Apple Watch.

More specifically, the Apple Watch band related patent covers systems, methods and apparatuses related to magnetic actuated attachment mechanisms. The band for Apple Watch includes first and second band links. The first band link may include one or more magnetic pins. The second band link may include one or more magnets and one or more apertures. In a first position the first and second band links may mechanically and magnetically couple by the magnet pulling the magnetic pin into the aperture and in a second position the first and second band links may mechanically and magnetically decouple by the magnetic pin being forced from the aperture. In this way, the band links may be easily and quickly coupled to and/or decoupled from each other.

A variety of mechanisms may be included that force the magnetic pin from the aperture in the second position. Such mechanisms may include repulsion between the magnetic pin and the magnet, springs, inner magnets, and/or other components.

Apple's patent FIG. 1 is an isometric view of an example system including a wearable device and a band including multiple links; FIG. 4A is a diagram illustrating example associated polarity patterns of the magnetic pins and the magnets; FIG. 7 is a cross sectional view of the first and second band links; and FIG. 10 is a flow chart illustrating an example method for assembling an attachment structure.

The patent appears to in-part relate to Apple's Link Bracelet as noted in our cover graphic. Whether Apple presented a round watch face in their patent application to originally throw off any potential competitors viewing the design or is a look of a future design is unknown at this time – though a round face is highly unlikely.

Apple credits Matthew Rohrbach as the sole inventor of granted patent 9,141,086 which was originally filed in Q3 2014 and published today by the US Patent and Trademark Office.

Apple Granted Two Design Patents Today

Apple was granted two design patents today. The first covers the Mac Pro as presented below (D739,397) and the second covers the iPod nano 6^th generation (D739,439).

It was reported yesterday that HP was making a hard pitch to pro designers to move from Apple's Mac Pro to the new HP Z workstation.

The Remaining Patents granted to Apple Today

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Patently Apple presents only a brief summary of granted patents with associated graphics for journalistic news purposes as each Granted Patent is revealed by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office. Readers are cautioned that the full text of any Granted Patent should be read in its entirety for full details. About Making Comments on our Site: Patently Apple reserves the right to post, dismiss or edit any comments. Comments are reviewed daily from 5am to 6pm MST and sporadically over the weekend.