Latest iPhone patent - light proximity sensor

[iAm]

Apple's latest iPhone patent has surfaced today uncovering a lot of new technical info about the product.

The patent entitled "Integrated proximity sensor and light sensor" describes the device's methods for sensing or determining user activities and responding to those activities.



Key Information from the Patent include:

At least certain embodiments of the inventions may be part of a digital media player, such as a portable music and/or video media player, which may include a media processing system to present the media, a storage device to store the media and may further include a radio frequency (RF) transceiver (e.g., an RF transceiver for a cellular telephone) coupled with an antenna system and the media processing system. In certain embodiments, media stored on a remote storage device may be transmitted to the media player through the RF transceiver. The media may be, for example, one or more of music or other audio, still pictures, or motion pictures.

The portable media player may include a media selection device, such as a click wheel input device on an iPod or iPod Nano media player from Apple Computer, Inc. of Cupertino, Calif., a touch screen input device, pushbutton device, movable pointing input device or other input device. The media selection device may be used to select the media stored on the storage device and/or the remote storage device.

Embodiments of the inventions described herein may be part of other types of data processing systems, such as, for example, entertainment systems or personal digital assistants (PDAs), or general purpose computer systems, or special purpose computer systems, or an embedded device within another device, or cellular telephones which do not include media players, or devices which combine aspects or functions of these devices (e.g., a media player, such as an iPod, combined with a PDA, an entertainment system, and a cellular telephone in one portable device).

Apple’s patent FIG. 2 below, illustrates a portable device according to one embodiment of the invention. FIG. 2 shows a wireless device in a telephone configuration having a “candy-bar” style. In FIG. 2, the wireless device may include a housing, a display device, an input device which may be an alphanumeric keypad, a speaker, a microphone and an antenna. The wireless device also may include a proximity sensor [point 44] and an accelerometer [point 46]. It will be appreciated that the embodiment of FIG. 2 may use more or fewer sensors and may have a different form factor from the form factor shown in FIG. 2.

Read more here: http://www.macnn.com/blogs/?p=287

[Fraid]

Nice find, the flip screen is interesting.