Apple Won 68 Patents Today covering MacBooks with Disappearing Controls, Two Project Titan Inventions & more
The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office officially published a series of 68 newly granted patents for Apple Inc. today. In this particular report we briefly cover three patents. Two of them cover Apple's electric semi or fully autonomous vehicles (under Project Titan) covering Automatic Configuration of Self-Configurable Environments and Vehicle with Automated Subsystems. The third granted patent highlighted covers controls that are generally invisible until they light up in the palm area of a MacBook or the surface of a TV remote and more. As always, we wrap up this week's granted patent report with our traditional listing of the remaining granted patents that were issued to Apple today.
Automatic Configuration of Self-Configurable Environments
Apple's newly granted patent covers their invention relating to self-configurable environments such as a vehicle. More specifically a user could allow their future iPhone to learn configuration preferences from the user's personal automobile, and when the user visits another automobile, such as when renting a car, or buying a new car, those configuration preferences could be imported into the visited automobile and used to automatically configure the automobile according to the imported preferences. Such preferences could include seat orientation, radio preferences (especially satellite radio), climate control preferences, and minor orientation preferences. Apple's patent FIG. 2 below illustrates an exemplary application of the present technology.
Apple's patent FIG. 2 below illustrates a side view of a passenger compartment (#200) of an automobile. As illustrated, the passenger compartment includes an adjustable steering wheel (#201), and adjustable seat (#203). By way of non-limiting example, the seat is adjustable up and down, backward and forward and increasing and decreasing an angle of recline (#206). The steering wheel is adjustable to move closer to and farther from the driver. While not shown, other aspects of the passenger experience can also be adjustable, such as mirrors, lumbar support, air conditioning temperature, radio preferences, etc.
Apple's patent FIG. 4 above illustrates a view from the rear of an automobile, which shows the back of a driver's head and its relationship to the rear view mirror (#402), driver's side mirror (#404), and passenger's side mirror (#406).
For more details, review Apple's granted patent 10,899,363.
Vehicle with Automated Subsystems
Road going vehicles have components that are responsible for controlling motion of the vehicle, such as steering components, propulsion components, and braking components. Vehicles can include controls that allow a human operator to direct motion of the vehicle. Vehicles can include automated systems that direct some or all aspects of motion of the vehicle.
Apple's granted patent covers a series of automated subsystems for a vehicle such as a propulsion system that is operable to independently control propulsion torque to each of the road wheels; A steering system is operable to independently control a steering angle of each of the road wheels: A braking system that is operable to independently control braking torque to each of the road wheels; An active suspension system regulates motion of the road wheels with respect to the vehicle body by independently controlling application of force to each of the road wheels; A vehicle control module is operable to determine a desired chassis-level motion, determine a control strategy to achieve the desired chassis-level motion, and output commands to each of the propulsion system, the steering system, the braking system, and the active suspension.
Apple's patent FIG. 1 below illustrates a wheeled vehicle that is intended for on-road use, to transport human passengers and/or cargo. The focus of the patent figure covers various subsystems such as a propulsion subsystem, a steering subsystem, a braking subsystem, an active suspension subsystem, a thermal management subsystem, power management subsystem, and a sensor subsystem.
Apple's patent FIG. 4 above is an illustration that shows a propulsion actuator assembly; FIG. 8 is an illustration that shows a braking actuator assembly.
For more details, review Apple's granted patent 10,899,340
Disappearing Controls on a MacBook
Considering that the "Mac" is back at Apple with a renewed energy, Apple's long-standing invention dating back to 2008 (published in 2010) has been granted its fifth patent covering invisible backlit holes on a device like a MacBook that make the input selectively visible or invisible to the user.
Patent FIG. 26 below illustrates a MacBook with an Invisible control shown to the left of the trackpad. As an example, the control may be used to control music or video. The Invisible control may have, for example, rewind (#5010), play (#5012), and fast forward (#5014) invisible buttons and it may have increase and decrease invisible volume controls.
For more details review Apple's granted patent 10,901,559.
The Remaining Patents granted to Apple Today
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