Granted Patent B2

US 12,431,002 · App. 17/603,923 · Granted Sep 30, 2025

Inventors: Ernst Thomas Erdmann, IV (San Francisco, CA); Sriram Hariharan (San Jose, CA); Brent M. Ledvina (San Francisco, CA); Scott Lopatin (San Francisco, CA); Robert W. Mayor (Half Moon Bay, CA)

Assignee: Apple Inc.

G08B21/24H04W76/19H04W4/80

Abstract

Claims (54)

1. A non-transitory machine-readable medium storing instructions to cause one or more processors of an electronic device to perform operations comprising:

establishing, by the electronic device, a wireless connection with a beacon peripheral;

monitoring a connection state of the wireless connection;

in response to detecting a loss of connection with the beacon peripheral, increasing a wireless scan rate of a wireless controller on the electronic device;

deferring display of a separation notification on the electronic device during a reconnect interval;

attempting to reconnect with the beacon peripheral during the reconnect interval; and

displaying the separation notification via a user interface of the electronic device in response to a failure to reconnect with the beacon peripheral.

2. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 1 , wherein the separation notification includes an identifier for the beacon peripheral and the identifier is a user-assigned name for the beacon peripheral.

3. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 1 , wherein establishing the wireless connection with the beacon peripheral includes pairing the beacon peripheral with the electronic device.

4. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 3 , wherein the wireless connection is a Bluetooth connection.

5. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 1 , the operations additionally comprising:

reconnecting with the beacon peripheral during the reconnect interval; and

clearing the separation notification for the beacon peripheral.

6. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 1 , the operations additionally comprising:

receiving, via the user interface, an indication of a selection of the separation notification; and

displaying a map via the user interface in response to the indication of the selection of the separation notification, wherein the map includes an indication of an observed location of the beacon peripheral, wherein the indication of the observed location of the beacon peripheral is a location corresponding to detection of a wireless advertisement of the beacon peripheral.

7. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 6 , wherein the indication of the observed location of the beacon peripheral is the location corresponding to detection of the wireless advertisement of the beacon peripheral by the electronic device.

8. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 6 , wherein the indication of the observed location of the beacon peripheral is the location corresponding to detection of the wireless advertisement of the beacon peripheral by a finder electronic device, the finder electronic device having uploaded the location to a device locator server.

9. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 8 , the operations additionally comprising:

querying the device locator server for a location of the beacon peripheral before displaying the indication of the observed location of the beacon peripheral on the map;

receiving the location for the beacon peripheral from the device locator server, wherein the location is encrypted via a public key associated with the beacon peripheral;

decrypting the location for the beacon peripheral using a private key associated with the beacon peripheral;

determining a location on the map to display the indication of the observed location of the beacon peripheral; and

displaying the indication of the observed location of the beacon peripheral.

10. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 9 , the operations additionally comprising adjusting a connection interval of the beacon peripheral based on a number of peripherals that are wirelessly connected to the electronic device.

11. A non-transitory machine-readable medium storing instructions to cause one or more processors of an electronic device to perform operations comprising:

establishing, by the electronic device, a wireless connection with a beacon peripheral;

monitoring a connection state of the wireless connection;

in response to detecting a loss of connection with the beacon peripheral, determining if a current location of the electronic device is indicated as a safe location for the beacon peripheral; and

suppressing display of a separation notification via a user interface of the electronic device for the beacon peripheral in response to a determination that the current location of the electronic device is the safe location.

12. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 11 , wherein the wireless connection is a Bluetooth connection.

13. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 11 , the operations additionally comprising:

attempting to reconnect with the beacon peripheral after detecting a loss of connection with the beacon peripheral in response to a determination that the current location of the electronic device is not a safe location; and

displaying the separation notification via a user interface in response to a failure to reconnect with the beacon peripheral.

14. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 13 , the operations additionally comprising presenting an interface element to designate a current location of the electronic device as a safe location.

15. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 11 , the operations additionally comprising:

detecting entry into a geofence associated with the safe location for the beacon peripheral; and

requesting a daemon associated with a wireless controller to disconnect the wireless connection with the beacon peripheral.

16. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 15 , the operations additionally comprising:

detecting exit from a geofence associated with the safe location;

requesting a daemon associated with the wireless controller to re-establish the wireless connection to the beacon peripheral; and

displaying the separation notification via a user interface in response to a failure to re-establish the wireless connection to the beacon peripheral.

17. A method performed by one or more processors of an electronic device, the method comprising:

establishing, by the electronic device, a wireless connection with a beacon peripheral;

monitoring a connection state of the wireless connection;

in response to detecting a loss of connection with the beacon peripheral, increasing a wireless scan rate of a wireless controller on the electronic device;

deferring display of the separation notification on the electronic device during a reconnect interval;

attempting to reconnect with the beacon peripheral during the reconnect interval; and

displaying the separation notification via a user interface of the electronic device in response to a failure to reconnect with the beacon peripheral.

18. The method as in claim 17 , wherein the separation notification includes an identifier for the beacon peripheral.

19. The method as in claim 17 , wherein establishing the wireless connection with the beacon peripheral includes pairing the beacon peripheral with the electronic device.

20. The method as in claim 17 , the method further comprising:

receiving, via the user interface, an indication of a selection of the separation notification; and

displaying a map via the user interface in response to the indication of the selection of the separation notification, wherein the map includes an indication of an observed location of the beacon peripheral, wherein the indication of the observed location of the beacon peripheral is a location corresponding to detection of a wireless advertisement of the beacon peripheral.

Continuity (3)

References Cited (380)