Patents Assigned to Apple
  • Patent number: 11023043
    Abstract: This disclosure relates to detecting hand gesture input using an electronic device, such as a wearable device strapped to a wrist. The device can have multiple photodiodes, each sensing light at a different position on a surface of the device that faces skin of a user. Examples of the disclosure detect hand gestures by recognizing patterns in sensor data that are characteristic of each hand gesture, as the tissue expands and contracts and anatomical features in the tissue move during the gesture.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 6, 2019
    Date of Patent: June 1, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Nicholas Paul Joseph Allec, Xiaoyi Mu
  • Patent number: 11023588
    Abstract: Systems and methods are disclosed for implementing an educational mode on a portable computing device, such as a tablet computer, that is a single-user system, used serially by multiple users. Each user can have a separate user storage that may be encrypted. The computing device boots as a system user to a login screen. A first student user enters user credentials into the login screen. The computing device can reboot the user-space processes, while leaving the kernel running, rebooting the computing device as the first student user. When the first student user logs out, data to be synchronized to, e.g., the cloud, can be synchronized for the first student user while a second student user is logged into the device.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 23, 2018
    Date of Patent: June 1, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Matthew W. Wright, Joseph R. Auricchio, Puja D. Gupta, Ananthakrishna Ramesh, Timothy P. Hannon
  • Patent number: 11024255
    Abstract: A display panel is calibrated to a target white point. A maximum luminance value of the display panel is attenuated from a first luminance value associated with the target white point to a second luminance value based on an attenuation factor. The second luminance value is equal to or lower than the first luminance value. The display panel is re-calibrated based on a chromaticity of the target white point and the second luminance value to generate calibration data. The calibration data is flashed into memory associated with the display panel. During operation, the white point of the panel may be shifted from the target to a chromatically imbalanced (e.g., reddish) white point that may cause motion-induced color trail or color breakup artifacts. The attenuated second luminance value ensures the motion-induced color trail or color breakup artifacts are adequately masked when the panel is driven with the chromatically imbalanced white point.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 8, 2019
    Date of Patent: June 1, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Gabriel Marcu, Rong Liu
  • Patent number: 11025347
    Abstract: Systems, methods, and devices are provided for compensating for distortion of a contactless communication channel. The electronic device may include a radio frequency system that itself includes antenna to transmit and receive data using near-field communication (NFC) and an NFC signal processing circuitry. The NFC signal processing circuitry may receive an NFC signal via a communication channel formed between the electronic device and another electronic device and may determine a baseband reference waveform associated with the electromagnetic NFC signal and may determine an error between a portion of the electromagnetic NFC signal and the baseband reference waveform. Furthermore, the NFC signal processing circuitry may determine whether the error is outside of an acceptable error threshold range and, in response to the error being outside of the acceptable error threshold range, train a filter response of the NFC signal processing circuitry to estimate the communication channel.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 6, 2020
    Date of Patent: June 1, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Xinping Zeng, Vusthla Sunil Reddy, Peter M. Agboh
  • Patent number: 11021126
    Abstract: An apparatus for resisting entry of objects through a windshield of a vehicle that has a passenger cabin. The apparatus includes an instrument panel that is located between the windshield and the passenger cabin, and an airbag that is deployable into an area above the instrument panel to resist entry of objects into the passenger cabin.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 18, 2018
    Date of Patent: June 1, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Alexander M. Zoellner, Arturo Llamazares Domper, Christopher D. Jones, David E. Kingman, Derek C. Scott, Jesse T. Buehler, Rikard Fredriksson, Stephen B. Lynch
  • Patent number: 11025861
    Abstract: Some embodiments provide a method for initiating a video conference using a first mobile device. The method presents, during an audio call through a wireless communication network with a second device, a selectable user-interface (UI) item on the first mobile device for switching from the audio call to the video conference. The method receives a selection of the selectable UI item. The method initiates the video conference without terminating the audio call. The method terminates the audio call before allowing the first and second devices to present audio and video data exchanged through the video conference.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 28, 2019
    Date of Patent: June 1, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Elizabeth C. Cranfill, Stephen O. Lemay, Joe S. Abuan, Hsi-Jung Wu, Xiaosong Zhou, Roberto Garcia, Jr.
  • Patent number: 11024887
    Abstract: The disclosed embodiments relate to a battery cell which includes a first electrode sheet having a first area and a second electrode sheet having a second area. The second area may be less than the first area. The battery cell also includes a first conductive tab coupled to the first electrode sheet and a second conductive tab coupled to the second electrode sheet. An insulator is disposed between the second conductive tab and the first electrode sheet, the insulator configured to prevent electrical current from flowing between the first electrode sheet and the second conductive tab. The battery cell also includes a pouch that encloses the first and second electrode sheets and a first and second battery terminal extending through the pouch. The first battery terminal may be coupled to the first conductive tab, and the second battery terminal may be coupled to the second conductive tab.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 5, 2018
    Date of Patent: June 1, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventor: Bradley L. Spare
  • Patent number: 11026062
    Abstract: This disclosure relates to techniques for managing mobile-terminating short message service re-transmissions for wireless devices. A cellular network entity of a cellular network may receive a request to provide a short message service message to a wireless device. The wireless device may be registered with the cellular network entity via at least two access types. An attempt to provide the short message service message to the wireless device via a first access type may be performed. An attempt to provide the short message service message to the wireless device via a second access type may be performed if the attempt to provide the short message service message to the wireless device via the first access type is unsuccessful.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 6, 2019
    Date of Patent: June 1, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Yifan Zhu, Utkarsh Kumar, Lakshmi N. Kavuri, Shivani Suresh Babu, Hariharan Sukumar, Krisztian Kiss
  • Patent number: 11023055
    Abstract: In accordance with some embodiments, a method is performed at an electronic device. The method includes in response to detecting that the stylus is proximate to the electronic device, pairing the electronic device with the stylus. The method includes in response to pairing the stylus with the electronic device: displaying, on the display, a first representation of a first gesture performed on the stylus; obtaining finger manipulation data from the stylus via the communication interface, wherein the finger manipulation data indicates a finger manipulation input received by the stylus; and in response to obtaining the finger manipulation data, displaying, on the display, a second representation of a second gesture performed on the stylus corresponding to the finger manipulation input received by the stylus.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 20, 2019
    Date of Patent: June 1, 2021
    Assignee: APPLE INC.
    Inventors: Gemma A. Roper, Stephen O. Lemay, Arian Behzadi, Parthiban Mohanraj, Tiffany S. Jon, Robert Garcia, III
  • Patent number: 11025456
    Abstract: Systems, apparatuses, methods, and computer-readable media are provided for time domain resource allocations in wireless communications systems. Disclosed embodiments include time-domain symbol determination and/or indication using a combination of higher layer and downlink control information signaling for physical downlink shared channel and physical uplink shared channel; time domain resource allocations for mini-slot operations; rules for postponing and dropping for multiple mini-slot transmission; and collision handling of sounding reference signals with semi-statically or semi-persistently configured uplink transmissions. Other embodiments may be described and/or claimed.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 11, 2019
    Date of Patent: June 1, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Debdeep Chatterjee, Sergey Panteleev, Gang Xiong, Ajit Nimbalker, Hong He
  • Patent number: 11026283
    Abstract: A client device can be configured to identify data to be communicated with a network. In some examples, the client device can determine one or more transient properties of the client device and/or receive a connection request from a host device that is connected to the network, where the connection request comprises one or more connection properties of the host device. In some instances, the client device can also be configured to determine whether the host device is capable of transmitting the data to the network based at least in part on the one or more transient properties of the client device and the one or more connection properties of the host device and/or establish a connection with the host device in accordance with determining that the host device is capable of transmitting the data to the network.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 5, 2018
    Date of Patent: June 1, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Ajoy K. Singh, Dennis Mathews, Paul V. Flynn, Wen Zhao, Yong Liu, Syed Aon Mujtaba, Sriram Hariharan, Matthew L. Semersky
  • Patent number: 11025622
    Abstract: Disclosed herein are systems, methods, and non-transitory computer-readable storage media for associating an application that was pre-installed on a computer with a user account on an online store. A system configured to practice the method presents an application available for download, receives a request to download the application to a computing devices, determines that the application is a pre-installed application, presents an authorization prompt configured to request user authorization to link the application with a user account, receives the user authorization, generates a unique hardware identifier associated with the computing devices, determines that the application is linkable based upon the unique hardware identifier, and links the adoptable application with the user account when the adoptable application is linkable.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 17, 2018
    Date of Patent: June 1, 2021
    Assignee: Apple, Inc.
    Inventors: Pedraum R. Pardehpoosh, Craig M. Federighi, Daniel I. Feldman, Gregory T. Quirk, Jack R. Matthew, Jackie Lee-Kang, Jean-Pierre Ciudad, Monika E. Gromek, Thomas K. Burkholder, Daniel Emil Pu, Sam Gharabally, Ellis Marshall Verosub, Yoon Sub Hwang
  • Patent number: 11024260
    Abstract: The disclosed techniques use a display device, optionally including optical and/or non-optical sensors providing information about the ambient environment of the display device—along with knowledge of the content that is being displayed—to predict a viewer of the display device's current visual adaptation. Using the viewer's predicted adaptation, the content displayed on the display device may be more optimally encoded. This encoding may be accomplished at encode time and may be performed in a display pipeline or, preferably, in the transfer function of the display itself—thereby reducing the precision required in the display pipeline. For example, in well-controlled scenarios where the viewer's adaptation may be fully characterized, e.g., a viewer wearing a head-mounted display (HMD) device, the full dynamic range of the viewer's perception may be encoded in 8 or 9 bits that are intelligently mapped to only the relevant display codes, given the viewer's current predicted adaptation.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 26, 2019
    Date of Patent: June 1, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventor: Kenneth I. Greenebaum
  • Patent number: 11026147
    Abstract: User equipment (UE) includes processing circuitry, where to configure the UE for Single Radio Voice Call Continuity (SRVCC) handover from an LTE network to a legacy network with circuit switched (CS) communications, the processing circuitry is to encode a Session Description Protocol (SDP) message for transmission to a second UE within the LTE network. The SDP message includes a voice codec selection for voice over LTE communication with the second UE and a maximum end-to-end packet loss rate (E2E_MAX_PLR) that can be tolerated by the UE when using the voice codec. The UE decodes an SRVCC handover command from an eNB within the LTE network, the handover command based on at least one packet loss rate (PLR) associated with a packet switched voice communication link between the UE and the second UE exceeding a PLR threshold that is determined based on the E2E_MAX_PLR that can be tolerated by the UE.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 13, 2019
    Date of Patent: June 1, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventor: Ozgur Oyman
  • Patent number: 11024012
    Abstract: An electronic device may include scaling circuitry to scale input pixel data to a greater resolution. The directional scaling circuitry may include first interpolation circuitry to receive best mode data, including one or more angles corresponding to content of the image and interpolate first pixel values at first pixel positions diagonally offset from input pixel positions of the input pixel data based on the best mode data and input pixel values corresponding to the input pixel positions. The directional scaling circuitry may also include second interpolation circuitry to receive the best mode data and the input pixel values and interpolate second pixel values at second pixel positions horizontally or vertically offset from the input pixel positions based at least in part on the best mode data and the input pixel values.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 2, 2018
    Date of Patent: June 1, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Jim C. Chou, Yun Gong
  • Patent number: 11026010
    Abstract: An earbud includes a housing that includes a driver assembly positioned within the housing forming a front volume in front of the driver and a back volume behind the driver. An acoustic insert is positioned behind the driver assembly and attached to an interior surface of the housing such that it forms a bass channel that is routed from the back volume to a vent in the housing.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 8, 2020
    Date of Patent: June 1, 2021
    Assignee: APPLE INC.
    Inventors: Arun D. Chawan, Kurt Stiehl, Benjamin A. Cousins, Jonathan S. Aase, Yacine Azmi, Paul Choiniere, Scott W. Slabaugh
  • Patent number: 11022802
    Abstract: An apparatus includes a transceiver and a controller in communication with the transceiver. The controller is configured to determine a target lighting condition in a room relative to a current lighting condition in the room. The controller is also configured to generate a control signal with instructions to adjust an ambient lighting peripheral in the room based on the determined target lighting condition. The control signal is provided to the transceiver for transmission.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 27, 2019
    Date of Patent: June 1, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Samuel L. Iglesias, In Young Yang, Timothy R. Oriol, James C. McIlree
  • Patent number: 11024006
    Abstract: A portable electronic device may include an image signal processor that includes a clipping circuit, a pyramid generator circuit, and an image fusion processor. The clipping circuit clips pixel values that are under-exposed or over-exposed. The pyramid generator circuit applies a filter to the pixels of the image to generate a filtered image. Some of the filtered pixels may be generated from one or more clipped pixel values. The pyramid generator circuit identifies those filtered pixels that are generated from one or more clipped pixel values and marks the identified filtered pixels with a tag. The pyramid generator circuit decimates the filtered image to generate a downscaled image, which may include one or more filtered pixels that are marked with the tags. The image fusion processor fuses the downscaled image with another image. The pixels that are marked with the tags may be disregarded in the fusion process.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 22, 2019
    Date of Patent: June 1, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Maxim Smirnov, Elena Lamburn, Oren Kerem, Chihsin Wu
  • Patent number: D920966
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 7, 2017
    Date of Patent: June 1, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Jody Akana, Molly Anderson, Bartley K. Andre, Shota Aoyagi, Anthony Michael Ashcroft, Marine C. Bataille, Jeremy Bataillou, Daniele De Iuliis, Markus Diebel, M. Evans Hankey, Julian Hoenig, Richard P. Howarth, Jonathan P. Ive, Julian Jaede, Duncan Robert Kerr, Peter Russell-Clarke, Benjamin Andrew Shaffer, Mikael Silvanto, Christopher J. Stringer, Joe Sung-Ho Tan, Clement Tissandier, Eugene Antony Whang, Rico Zörkendörfer
  • Patent number: D920984
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 25, 2013
    Date of Patent: June 1, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Richard P. Howarth, Wesley Bryan Hamm, Frederico F. Tio, Frank Craig Thaler, Russell John Kaaihue Heirakuji