Your iPhone can track your number of steps, and your Apple Watch can advise you if you have an erratic heart rate you might want to get checked out by a doctor. Could your friendly neighborhood Apple device also one day let you know if you need to put on more sunscreen, too?
That’s the basis for a new patent application published today. And rather than just being in response to sunny days on Apple’s Weather app, it’s actually pretty darn smart technology. Here’s how it might operate.
It sounds like science fiction, but Apple has created a method for making stretchable displays. This means that, instead of your computer being in your pocket or on your wrist, it could be made into your shirt.
Phones with flexible displays are expected in the next year or so, but these are just intended to be foldable. The screen Apple is just received a patent for could be wadded up into a ball.
Siri has plenty of problems, but it just got one more: a lawsuit claiming Apple’s technology is infringing on patents belonging to another company.
The company in question, Advanced Voice Recognition Systems, is suing Apple for infringing on its previously held patent “Speech Recognition and Transcription Among Users Having Heterogeneous Protocols.”
Apple’s allegedly offending products include *deep breath* the iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch, HomePod, and Apple TV. Everything that runs Siri, basically!
Apple is developing technology that would combine a cylindrical device and possibly smart clothing to provide blind and deaf people tactile or auditory signals to navigate their environments.
According to a patent application filed by Apple today, the device would map the environment with sensor data and provide feedback. For the blind, the device could sync with an iPhone to provide spoken feedback to the blind. For the deaf, vibrating signals could be delivered to a wearable, such as a shirt or the Apple Watch.
Some believe Facebook is already using our smartphones to hear our private conversations. That’s not true, but the social network is certainly considering it.
Facebook has applied for a new patent that describes a method of tapping into our microphones to listen to our reactions to TV ads. It’s just as invasive as it sounds.
The federal government has awarded Apple a patent for iPhone users to transfer data by bumping together handsets.
If this sounds familiar, it is because bump transfers for both iOS and Android have been possible through apps, most notably an app called Bump that debuted in 2008.
Apple has recruited popular science YouTuber Mark Rober to work as part of its top secret special projects group, developing a VR on-board entertainment system for self-driving cars.
Rober has been working with Apple for the past several years, although he has kept news of Apple’s identity secret. In a Reddit AmA, he described it as a “large tech company in the Bay Area.” His name was revealed as part of several patent applications Apple has recently filed.
Apple is actively working on a handwriting recognition system. This raises the distinct possibility that you might someday enter text by writing words on your iPhone or iPad screen, rather than tapping out letters on a virtual keyboard.
Some will remember that Apple’s tried something similar before and it didn’t go well.
Down the road, as you gaze into the monitor of a new iMac, the screen could gaze back.
Apple was awarded a patent Thursday by the United States Patent & Trademark Office for adjustable reflective display technology that can track your gestures, including eye and head movements.
While you’re still missing the headphone jack on an iPhone, prepare your mind for a future Apple handset without the side buttons.
Apple applied for a patent this morning on squeeze detection sensors that could replace the input buttons and add “deformable” walls to the housing.
Last month, a jury ordered Samsung to pay Apple $539M for infringing on its patents. Now, the Korean company wants that decision thrown out.
It again says it should pay a far, far smaller amount for stealing many of the design elements of the iPhone.
At WWDC, Apple revealed that it will finally make it possible to do FaceTime group calls for up to 32 people. That’s great news — provided that all your friends, family and co-workers use Apple devices.
But it didn’t have to be like this. Back in 2010, when Steve Jobs introduced FaceTime, he made a big point about how it was set to become an open industry standard that could be used by Apple’s competitors, as well as Apple. Nearly a decade on, that still hasn’t happened. And now a theory has emerged as to why.
With iOS 11, Apple introduced a “Do Not Disturb” feature that texts callers to let them know you’re driving or otherwise engaged if they try and phone when you’re busy. But a future version of the technology could perform a more useful feat by texting context-specific responses to the person calling.
In a patent application published today, Apple describes how your iPhone could analyze available information — ranging from fitness tracking apps to your calendar and location information — to figure out the most useful response to a message.
Apple and Samsung are heading back to court again today for the latest chapter in their never-ending legal battle.
Seven years after Apple first sued Samsung for copying the iPhone, this is the third retrial over the same five patents being contested in the suit. And we don’t expect it to be the last retrial, either!
The Apple Watch has come a long way since it was first introduced back in 2015. One thing it hasn’t done? Gone circular, with Apple instead opting to stick with its rectangular display for all iterations of the wearable device.
But that could (possibly) one day change, based on a granted Apple patent that was published earlier today.
Apple today received a patent for a device with a bendable display. Sadly, that doesn’t mean that an clamshell iPhone is right around the corner. The wait for an iPad that be folded up and slipped in a pocket is probably still going to be a long one.
The patent was filed in 2016 because Apple is just preparing for the day when bendable displays are a reality.
Samsung’s design team avoided ripping off the iPhone X’s notch for the Galaxy S9, but that could be about to change. The South Korean company has now patented its first iPhone X clone, complete with a notch at the top of its screen.
A future MacBook might have a hybrid keyboard that can sense when the. keys are lightly touched as well as when they’re pressed. This would allow the entire keyboard to function as a trackpad.
Apple wants to redesign the keyboard. It’s proposed various ways to make this classic input device more functional. Last month, it floated the idea of a replacing the keyboard with a flexible touch panel.
Bad drivers may soon get some crucial tips on the road from Apple, if the company’s latest patent ever becomes a reality.
While everyone in tech is working on driverless car systems, it appears that Apple is looking into ways to make it safer for humans to get behind the wheel too. Apple filed for a patent this week that envisions an augmented reality system for cars that shows drivers more of what’s ahead of them than they can see with their naked eyes. And it could totally change the way we drive.
Apple engineers are looking into a laptop that uses a touchscreen in place of a keyboard. The second screen would be slightly flexible, allowing keys to depress. It would also be extremely customizable –basically like a giant Touch Bar.
Apple designed a waterproof Lighting connector that could block out liquids, dust and dirt when inserted into an iPhone.
Your next set of Apple earbuds might be about to get some serious health upgrades.
Tracking your heart rate while jogging soon may only require using earbuds, as a new patent filing show that Apple seems very serious about adding biometric sensing to its AirPods.
Bulky virtual reality headsets may soon look like retro relics if Apple’s designers have their way.
Details of a new patent from Apple reveal the company is investigating different ways to reduce the size of bulky augmented reality and virtual reality headsets. The patents specifically mentions a tech that its rivals aren’t using, which could give it big advantage if it enters the market.
Apple is investigating new ways to make self-driving care systems drive more like humans, based on a recent patent filing from the iPhone-maker.
The USPTO finally published Apple’s first patent application related to autonomous vehicle systems today, giving some insight into the strategies Apple might use to make its mark in the emerging self-driving car market.
Apple is exploring new ways to make Siri smarter — and one of them involves letting Siri know when you want to keep the noise level low by whispering.
According to a patent application published this week, Apple is interested in, “a digital assistant that is capable of detecting a whispered speech input and providing a whispered speech response.” That could be useful in scenarios such as protecting your privacy, while still letting you use its speech capabilities, or settings where high volume levels are prohibited.
