Apple granted patents: system for sensing ambient light, device holder, more
Posted by Dennis Sellers 
May 23, 2006 at 9:35am
On May 23, the US Patent & Trademark Office revealed three new patents that were granted to Apple, which included: Method and apparatus for ensuring compatibility on a high performance serial bus, Electronic device holder and System for sensing ambient light having ambient stability probability.
Patent 7,049,575: System for sensing ambient light having ambient stability probability.
Patent Figure 1 illustrates a laptop computer having light sensors disposed near the keyboard;
Abstract: A system and method for sensing ambient light. The system has a first sensor for measuring a first ambient light level and a second sensor for measuring a second ambient light level. A processor in communication with the first sensor and the second sensor is configured to determine a relative intensity change in the ambient light levels for each of the first and second sensors. The processor also determines an ambient stability probability in response to the relative intensity changes in order to generate first and second filtered ambient light levels which are used as ambient light measurements.
Patent excerpt: For example, the method of sensing ambient light of the present invention can also be used to adjust the brightness of other devices such as televisions, lights, handheld devices, etc., or could be used to control enclosure, lighting, video conferencing camera sensitivity, music volume etc. Further, although the system components in FIG. 5 are illustrated as being connected to a single bus, the invention is not limited to any particular architecture.
Inventor: Steve Hotelling
Patent D521,232: Electronic device holder
Patent Claim: We claim the ornamental design for an electronic device holder, substantially as shown and described.
FIG. 1 is a front perspective view of an electronic device holder in accordance with the present design. FIG. 2 is a rear perspective view for the electronic device holder shown in FIG. 1.
Inventors: Bartley K. Andre, Daniel J. Coster, Daniele De Luliis, Richard P. Howarth, Jonathan P. Ive, Duncan Robert Kerr, Shin Nishibori, Matthew Dean Rohrbach, Douglas B. Satzger, Calvin Q. Seid, Christopher J. Stringer and Eugene Antony Whang
Patent 7,050,453: Method and apparatus for ensuring compatibility on a high performance serial bus
The patent relates to data communications. In particular, the present invention relates to ensuring compatibility on a high performance serial bus system.
Abstract: A data communications system is disclosed having at least one Legacy cloud coupled to at least one Beta cloud. The system further having at least one BOSS node and at least one border node. A method for ensuring compatibility is disclosed comprising determining when the BOSS node is idle, determining whether the last packet transmitted by any border node was an Alpha format packet if the BOSS node is idle, and unlocking the Legacy cloud if the last packet transmitted by the border node was not an Alpha format packet.
Inventors: Jerrold V. Hauck and Colin Whitby-Strevens. (Great Britain)
Notice
Macsimum News presents only a brief summary of patents with associated graphic(s) for journalistic news purposes as each such patent application and/or grant is revealed by the U.S. Patent & Trade Office. Readers are cautioned that the full text of any patent applications and/or grants should be read in its entirety for further details.
neo@macsimumnews.com
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Dennis Sellers
Dennis has been a newspaper editor/reporter (seven years) and teacher (seven years). He has over 4,000 magazine, newspaper and online articles to his credit. He has also covered the Mac and tech industries for over a decade for such online publications as MacCentral, MacMinute and now MacsimumNews.
