Future iPhone, Mac may power down when you look away

Posted:
in Future Apple Hardware edited August 2021
From MacBook Pro to iPad, Apple is investigating the use of gaze detection, and attention sensing, to know when you're not using a device and it can save battery power.

Apple wants to preserve battery power every way it can
Apple wants to preserve battery power every way it can


Apple devices already save power by turning themselves off, or dimming their screen, but it's quite crude. If you haven't touched the device for a certain period of time, if you haven't talked to Siri through it, then it powers down.

Rather than relying on this stopwatch kind of approach, though, Apple wants to have devices know sooner, and for certain, whether you need them at full power or not.

"Attention detection service," is a newly-granted patent that is concerned with figuring out whether or not you're interested in what the device is doing.

"The attention detection service may monitor various peripheral devices in the device for indications that a user is paying attention to the device," says the patent. "Typically, mobile devices are designed to operate from a mobile power source such as a battery... Accordingly the energy is a scarce resource that is desirable to conserve."

It is chiefly so that battery power can be conserved better, but Apple argues that it's also useful for devices that are plugged in.

"While other types of devices (e.g. devices that are plugged into the wall outlet) may not have as critical a need to conserve energy, such devices may wish to reduce energy usage for other reasons," it continues.

"For example, energy consumption is often correlated with an increase in thermal energy that needs to be removed from the device," says Apple. "Inefficient energy consumption can thus cause higher thermal energy in the system, requiring more cooling to extract the thermal energy."

Say you've started a podcast and put your iPhone down. Apple is proposing that the iPhone could recognize that you're not looking at the screen.

If the iPhone's microphone also detects that you're not saying anything, it can reasonably infer that it's fine to dim the screen.

It's really up to the device and operating system what it does with the information that you're disinterested. So the patent is devoted to how multiple sensors -- gaze detection, touch screens, and so on -- can determine if you care what the device is doing.

That's sometimes a harder job than it sounds. With an Apple TV 4K, for instance, it's difficult to know whether someone has left the room, or is utterly absorbed in "Schmigadoon!"

Detail from the patent showing just how many different types of sensors and peripherals could contribute to figuring out if you're awake
Detail from the patent showing just how many different types of sensors and peripherals could contribute to figuring out if you're awake


Apple TV 4K currently has a timer that can be set to turn off the device after 15 minutes, 30 minutes, an hour, and so on. But it only knows it's not being used if you have left it at the home screen.

You could start a "Lord of the Rings" movie on Apple TV 4K, for instance, then turn off your TV set and go out. The device has no way to know that you aren't glued to the minutes, hours, or entire month it takes Sean Bean's character to die.

However, if the Apple TV 4K can also know that your Apple Watch is now in the bathroom, it could pause for you. If it detects that you're using CarPlay, it can assume you're driving to work and have forgotten to switch off the Apple TV 4K.

Ultimately, future Apple devices may even figure out when the YouTube video you're watching is particularly dull, and skip to a better one.

This patent is credited to 13 inventors. That unusually high number includes two -- Kelsey Y. Ho and Benjamin Biron -- whose previous work includes how iPhones could orient their display by detecting your face.

Read on AppleInsider

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 13
    M68000M68000 Posts: 719member
    This reminds me of several new Dell laptops I’ve seen at work that have a proximity sensor.   They start to dim and shut down very quick as soon as you move away.  Let me tell you -  everybody hates it.  I’ve shut off that feature on all of them.
    applguy
  • Reply 2 of 13
    You could start a "Lord of the Rings" movie on Apple TV 4K, for instance, then turn off your TV set and go out. The device has no way to know that you aren't glued to the minutes, hours, or entire month it takes Sean Bean's character to die.”

    This is an odd example. If you turn your TV off, it powers off the Apple TV too (unless you configure it to not do that in the HDMI-CEC settings). 
  • Reply 3 of 13
    AppleZuluAppleZulu Posts: 1,989member
    M68000 said:
    This reminds me of several new Dell laptops I’ve seen at work that have a proximity sensor.   They start to dim and shut down very quick as soon as you move away.  Let me tell you -  everybody hates it.  I’ve shut off that feature on all of them.
    It all depends on the execution. What’s described here appears to be a higher level of sophistication in determining whether the user is engaged with the device. If done poorly, it would be profoundly annoying. If done well, it would be almost invisible to the user, because it would do its thing only when the user isn’t engaged with the device. 
  • Reply 4 of 13
    M68000 said:
    This reminds me of several new Dell laptops I’ve seen at work that have a proximity sensor.   They start to dim and shut down very quick as soon as you move away.  Let me tell you -  everybody hates it.  I’ve shut off that feature on all of them.
    As long as the option to turn a feature on or off exists, I mostly don't care whether Apple implements features I won't use.  It's when they make the new functionality on with no way to turn it off that I get irritated.  Fortunately, that doesn't happen often enough for me to remember the last one.
    Japhey
  • Reply 5 of 13
    bluefire1bluefire1 Posts: 1,301member
    How about just making a larger, more efficient battery
    so this becomes a non issue.
  • Reply 6 of 13
    jSnivelyjSnively Posts: 429administrator
    bluefire1 said:
    How about just making a larger, more efficient battery
    so this becomes a non issue.
    Chemestry and physics are hard

    beowulfschmidtAppleZulu
  • Reply 7 of 13
    AppleZuluAppleZulu Posts: 1,989member
    jSnively said:
    bluefire1 said:
    How about just making a larger, more efficient battery
    so this becomes a non issue.
    Chemestry and physics are hard

    Plus, larger, more efficient batteries beget faster, more power-hungry hardware and apps.
  • Reply 8 of 13
    lkrupplkrupp Posts: 10,557member
    jSnively said:
    bluefire1 said:
    How about just making a larger, more efficient battery
    so this becomes a non issue.
    Chemestry and physics are hard

    And that’s the problem holding back everything. As for the electric car, for example, until battery technology has a breakthrough that allows you to drive 400 miles and then recharge 100% in five minutes, like internal combustion engines, people will not accept it. 

    Having worked in an AT&T central office for over thirty years I occasionally was asked to give the nickel tour to electrical or computer engineering students. After showing them magical fiber optic, digital transmission equipment on the first floor I took them to the basement to the power plant and showed them the rows upon rows of giant lead/antimony storage batteries filled with hydrochloric acid, 800 amp rectifiers, and 800kw diesel generator that took over when commercial power failed. I’d point to the batteries and tell the youngsters, “Without that almost 200 year old technology sitting there none of the stuff I showed you upstairs would work... period.” 
    edited August 2021 beowulfschmidt
  • Reply 9 of 13
    fastasleepfastasleep Posts: 6,408member
    Apple TV 4K currently has a timer that can be set to turn off the device after 15 minutes, 30 minutes, an hour, and so on. But it only knows it's not being used if you have left it at the home screen.
    You could start a "Lord of the Rings" movie on Apple TV 4K, for instance, then turn off your TV set and go out. The device has no way to know that you aren't glued to the minutes, hours, or entire month it takes Sean Bean's character to die.


  • Reply 10 of 13
    bluefire1bluefire1 Posts: 1,301member
    jSnively said:
    bluefire1 said:
    How about just making a larger, more efficient battery
    so this becomes a non issue.
    Chemestry and physics are hard

    So is spelling Chemistry 😉
  • Reply 11 of 13
    Dude. Boromir. I know not everyone shares my fascination with TLOTR, but the character is a major part of the story and IMDB is not far away.
  • Reply 12 of 13
    Nah. It's just a patent.
  • Reply 13 of 13
    netroxnetrox Posts: 1,415member
    bluefire1 said:
    How about just making a larger, more efficient battery
    so this becomes a non issue.
    Just no. The more battery you put in, the more it consumes energy. We need much more power-efficient chips that can reduce the power consumption on every level.  

    When you have 1,000,000,000 iPhones, even a little bit of energy savings can translate into huge reduction for the whole. 



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