In 2015 Patently Apple posted a report titled "Apple Invents a Touch Screen that users will finally be able to Control with Gloves on." Today the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office officially granted Apple a patent that relates to a new glove touch detection mode methodology.

Apple's granted patent, that skipped the patent application process under the Apple name, generally covers a touch sensor panel or touch screen and, more specifically, to an electronic device that transitions between touch detection modes based on one or more criteria related to the detected touch data.

In some examples, the electronic device is able to detect touch in a bare finger touch mode with an associated bare finger touch detection threshold or in a glove touch mode with an associated glove touch detection threshold that is lower than the bare finger touch detection threshold.

Detecting touch can include sensing touch signals of an input patch corresponding to a proximate object (e.g., a conductive object such as a finger or stylus), for example. In some examples, the electronic device can calculate the slope of the signal density over time.

While operating in the bare finger touch detection mode, in response to detecting a touch signal density slope that satisfies a plurality of predetermined criteria, the electronic device can transition from the bare finger touch detection mode to the glove touch detection mode.

Apple's patent FIG. 2 below illustrates an example computing system including a touch screen that can use glove touch detection techniques; FIG. 6A illustrates an exemplary signal density diagram for an object touching and lifting off a touch sensor panel.

For more details, review Apple's granted patent 10,963,095.