back to article Can't find your motor? Apple patents solve car park conundrums

Apple has filed a series of patents which will help people find their motors in a crowded car park and then open the doors without using a key. The patents that emerged today are called "method for locating a vehicle" and "accessing a vehicle using portable devices". The first sets out a system for anyone who wants to leave …

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  1. b0llchit Silver badge
    Facepalm

    It involves (new) computers, phones and wireless

    Well, if the patents are granted, then all hope for the USPTO should be extinguished in one final blow. The criteria of "obvious to a person skilled in the field" seems to be a total loss for the USPTO.

    I'm now waiting for a patent to be granted on "waving a hand by means of electronic communication using a wireless infrastructure". Hell, it involves computers and phones and whatever electronics, so it must be worthy.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: It involves (new) computers, phones and wireless

      prior art too, I am positive i've heard of phones being used to open cars before....

      Also there are car finder apps out there already!

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: It involves (new) computers, phones and wireless

        ZipCar/ZipVan allow you to use your phone to lock and unlock their vehicles as well as sounding the horn through their app.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Another Way to Push Out Possible Customers

    I had two thought reading this,

    1) Are the customers for this sort of non device really suitable to drive a car or are they the sort of lame brains who drive to the end of a merge lane on a motor way and stop wondering which way to go? On second thoughts perhaps they use apple maps?

    2) Please let me know which car make want to 'help' their customers with this so that I know which cars to avoid buying, - or getting too close to on the road.

    1. Armando 123

      Re: Another Way to Push Out Possible Customers

      If only competent people were allowed to drive, no one would buy a Kia or Prius. So I'm for it!

      1. James Hughes 1

        Re: Another Way to Push Out Possible Customers

        @Armando 123

        Just bought the wife a Kia Soul - she loves it, and with 6.5years left of the guarantee, and 3 years free servicing so do I. I'm going to save a lot of garage time. Drives OK (Not race car handling of course - and yes, I have raced cars), full featured, looks funky. Pleased so far.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Another Way to Push Out Possible Customers

      I was thinking about the same thing... anyone not competent enough to need an app. to find their car, really has no business owning a car. It's bad enough that people are dumbing themselves down in the memory department.

      1. BongoJoe
        Facepalm

        Re: Another Way to Push Out Possible Customers

        "I was thinking about the same thing... anyone not competent enough to need an app. to find their car, really has no business owning a car."

        Many years ago I parked my car one of the long stay car parks at Brussels airport to go to Norway for a month or so on business. I carefully made a note of the car park building number, the floor, the zone and what have you.

        Four weeks passed and i returned to the airport, found the bit of paper in the Filofax (yes, it was those days), hunted down the car park building number, climbed to the right floor and then looked for the car in the correct zone.

        Nothing. Not a car there. I checked and checked again but, no, nothing and it was then that I could have used such as app.

        As it happens, I found the car many hours later - they had renumbered all the car parks whilst I was away.

  3. James 36
    Meh

    optional

    steal the phone, steal the car, rob the house

    welcome to the new iCrime

    1. Brenda McViking
      Meh

      Re: optional

      Yeah, it's almost like if you mugged me now - I have 3 items in my pockets. Key fob, wallet and phone. What kind of opportunistic theif isn't going to take the lot?

      "Oh you know what? business is good right now, I think I'll just take the wallet - you can keep the phone and keys..."

      ...said no robber, ever.

      That said, of those 3 items, the only one that isn't tracked is the wallet...

      1. James Micallef Silver badge

        Re: optional

        However if you're mugged and the mugger takes your car keys, he won't know where your car is parked.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: optional

          However if you're mugged and the mugger takes your car keys, he won't know where your car is parked.

          On the other hand, which would you prefer? That your mugger take off with your phone and be able to locate, open and start your car, or that your mugger take your wallet, keys and phone and then points his gun at your head and says "show me where your car is?"

          If I'm going to be mugged, I'd prefer to give him everything he needs to complete the mugging as efficiently as possible. Better to be left without a car than become a hostage should the police interrupt me showing him where I've parked.

          1. MachDiamond Silver badge
            Big Brother

            Re: optional

            Muggers usually just want your cash/wallet/purse, your Rolex/Diamond Ring and your iThingy before disappearing over the horizon. It's not very common that they would want you to take them to your car. It's much easier to just grab somebody just getting in or out of their car.

            I found the car park renumbering story a good laugh. I wonder how many people wound up wandering around looking for their car. Evil bastards! They were probably all up in the security office with some beer and salty snacks laughing their as$es off.

            I really don't want my car spewing forth any information. The OEM alarm/remote systems are already bad enough. Crooks are having a great time visiting large shopping center car parks and running a little app that can output an avalanche of codes in just seconds. Sure, it sets off a bunch of alarms, but it also unwinds the windows and starts the ignition. All of the alarms just make a nice distraction.

            I bet the finance companies are salivating for cars that can be locked out when somebody is late on their payment. It would also be handy for repo companies to be able to go online and have a car located with within 3 meters and also be able to shoot it a code when they get there to take possession. There's also the coppers that would love to be able to kill your engine at-will any time, just in case you decide to take them on a high speed chase or not buckle up. How would people feel about their satnav uploading everywhere they've been to "The Man" (or the Mrs)? I think that older model cars will suddenly gain in value if any of the above nightmares come to pass.

  4. g e
    Facepalm

    WTF?

    There's been 'where did I park' style apps since well before 2011.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Facepalm

      Re: WTF?

      That's what I thought too - had one on my Android phone for ages.

      I prefer to use biological memory storage and stereo optical devices linked to a visual cortex to find my car. i.e. remember where you left the thing and look for it.

    2. Gerard Krupa

      Re: WTF?

      Yes, but they use the old fashioned over-simple method of "remembering where I parked" whereas this proposes something much more complicated, error-prone and time-consuming i.e. "asking the car where it is but only if you're already within 20m of that location and have reasonable line of sight" which is what mobile technology is all about (ever compared transferring your contact info by Bluetooth vs. just telling someone your phone number?).

    3. JetSetJim

      Re: WTF?

      I don't dispute the "wtf" element to your post, but doesn't the iDonut HQ building have a big underground car park? GPS won't work there, so it is logical to have such a system in place for dopey iWorkers.

      I completely agree that the patent is in the "bleedin' obvious" category, and should be denied with all due speed.

  5. thesykes

    Are the worlds car parks full of iPhone owners, wandering aimlessly around, unable to find their cars?

    Are there special teams of car park attendants who round them up and take them round the back, and put them out of their misery with a single shot to the back of the head?

    1. VinceH

      Optional

      We can but dream.

    2. Armando 123
      Coat

      Whereas Android owners have to take the bus.

      (Yes, it's true, as I get older, I'm turning into Jeremy Clarkson)

      1. thesykes

        This Android user uses the brain he was born with.

        Get out of car, look round, see where stairs/doors/exit/lift are

        Get to stairs or lift and make note of floor number.

        Remember these facts.

        So far, I've never actually misplaced a car.

  6. Amonynous

    Americanese

    ""parking structure", or “car park” for anyone not fluent in Cupertinian."

    Much as it pains me to defend anything Apple, Parking Structure is just another example of two nations divided by a common language rather than another laughable attempt make simple things seem complex. Parking Structure = Multi-Storey Car Park, Parking Garage = Underground Car Park (or sometimes M-S CP inside a larger building), Parking Lot = Car Park.

    1. TeeCee Gold badge
      Meh

      Re: Americanese

      You have to say that the version in which all of them are described as a "car park", with optional modifiers for type of same, is the right one......

    2. MachDiamond Silver badge

      Re: Americanese

      Unless the car park is for lorries. Then, it's a lorry nest.

      hommage to Terry Prachett.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I think I see the problem here...

    The kind of fashion victim who "must have" the latest iDevice is also the type of person who "must have" a "Home Appliance White" Audi or "Dense Sea Fog Silver" BMW. Unfortunately this means that the kind of overpriced "coffee" establishments these idiots congregate at has a car park that resembles the back of an Audi/BMW dealer, with two rows of identical cars.

    Expecting the iPerson to remember their own car registration or where they parked is of course a bridge too far...

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: I think I see the problem here...

      I'd been wondering what it was that drove me towards an white Audi A6, now I understand it was the subconscious iControl being radiated from the damned company iPhone.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: I think I see the problem here...

        Company iPhone AND a Company A6? There's no hope for you sorry ;)

  8. Steve 13
    Facepalm

    Let me get this straight

    They are trying to patent putting bluetooth transceivers into cars and carparks (they're already in phones), and having them communicate... And an app then using this communication data to tell you where your car is.

    Which part of that isn't just using existing off the shelf functionality to do something obvious?

    The app is the only bit that doesn't already exist, and as already pointed out, there is plenty of prior art.

  9. Frankee Llonnygog

    Wouldnt it be simpler

    just to bookmark a GPS location?

    1. Andrew Moore
      FAIL

      Re: Wouldnt it be simpler

      Difficult to do when there aren't any visible satellites due to you being inside a structure

      1. Frankee Llonnygog

        Re: Wouldnt it be simpler

        Yes, I suppose. But you could call down an air strike. OK, you'll blow your car up, but you'll exorcise the frustration of misplacing it

        1. Yet Another Anonymous coward Silver badge

          Re: Wouldnt it be simpler

          Literary alternatives - just leave a trail of breadcrumbs, or unwind a thread from your cloak

  10. SynicNZ

    A pen anyone

    Just write the location down on your entry ticket

    1. Peter H. Coffin

      Re: A pen anyone

      which lasts until you're parked someplace where the ticket must be pre-paid and placed someplace visible to prove you've paid to park there. That is, any place that doesn't number the actual spaces which depend on idiots (that is, other people) to remember a three-digit number for whole minutes.

      1. jonathanb Silver badge

        Re: A pen anyone

        Then you can record it on the Notes App on your iDevice. I usually do that as I don't have a pen with me.

  11. Tsung
    FAIL

    Already exists!

    I already have a device that can remotely locate my car in a busy car park. It's called a key fob, I push the button and if my car is near the car lights flash and the doors unlock. I'm not entirely sure what is original or new about this patent?

    Again; we should be questioning the ability of someone's driving if they cannot remember where they parked their car.

    1. Colin Miller

      Re: Already exists!

      Unless you have a wireless pass-card car, where the doors unlock if the handle is pulled whilst the card is beside the car. And the engine starts when the the 'start button' is pushed and the card is (again) nearby.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Already exists!

      Yep. Can turn on the lights or, press and hold to set the alarm off.

      Was quite handy recently on a trip to Alton Towers. Arriving back in the carpark to find everything pretty poorly lit - pressed the lights button and there she is, lighting up our way across the grass!

      1. Yet Another Anonymous coward Silver badge

        Re: Already exists!

        Or if you have an original Nokia phone you could just throw it as hard as possible at random until it hit your car and set off the alarm which you recognise - and with a old Nokia the phone would still work

  12. Locky
    Coat

    Doesn't have quite the same ring to it

    Dude, Where's My App That Will Make This A Much Shorter Film

    1. Velv
      Alien

      Re: Doesn't have quite the same ring to it

      aw, man, I wish that had been around - there's 83 minutes of my life I'm never getting back

  13. My-Handle

    A possible problem...

    I currently have my bus pass on my phone and occasionally run into one problem. Like most smart phones out there, my battery won't really last two full days of normal use (my fiancee's won't even last one). If my battery dies, I have no bus ticket and must pay for a paper one. If I have no key or fob for my car, instead relying on my phone to find it and unlock it, exactly how stuffed am I if the battery fails? The battery life for even the worst key fob is likely measured in months, and of course metal keys (or paper bus tickets) handily never run out of battery at all.

    1. Field Marshal Von Krakenfart
      Boffin

      Re: A possible problem...

      key fob battery life....

      Currently 13 years

    2. Bugsy11

      Re: A possible problem...

      iWatch = back up key.

  14. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Need to add the mode where you send a command from you iPhone to get the car to turn on the engine and aircon so that when you arrive 10 mins later its nice and cool ..... this would avoid the need for people to leave their cars in car parks with engines and aircon running all the time they are shopping (and I've lived in Cupertino and seen this happen!)

    1. Darryl

      Most of the high end remote car starters have these options, and a lot of them have phone apps. Of course, where I live, it's more to start the car and get the heater running so you don't freeze your ass off...

    2. hplasm
      WTF?

      ...engines and aircon running all the time...

      Sounds like he price of fuel is *way* too low in Cupertino...

  15. Peter H. Coffin

    Even more fun, in the US, Verizon *has already been selling this*, as an add-on accessory. Look for Verizon Vehicle Diagnostics by Delphi.

  16. The Vociferous Time Waster

    T5

    IIRC Heathrow Airport Terminal 5 (AKA God's own Terminal) has a car park that guides you to a parking spot. When you return from your trip and pay the immense cost of parking at the terminal you can use a vending type machine to find out where you parked your car. The ticket also has your car reg number on it which is checked by cameras on the way out so you can't drive in with a Ford Fiesta and then drive out with a stolen Audi.

    1. MachDiamond Silver badge

      Re: T5

      If you forget where your car is in the T5 Biz lot, just ride the pods back and forth while looking out for your motor. Still might not find your car quicker then walking the aisles where you think it might be, but fun anyway.

  17. SirDigalot

    here in yankeeland

    GM already has an app for their onstar vehicles that allows you to remote open/lock start and horn and lights your car, ok it cannot exactly 'locate' it but it has a greater range than the keyfob, I have used it a couple of times in a car park to access horns and lights and followed the sound...

    the downside is it will not work where there is no signal for onstar but saying that if it has no signal neither does your phone unless the car park has a mobile repeater on it

    I used the remote start in cold Midwestern winters to warm the car up, and now in the deep south summers to cool the car off before I get there.... wasteful hell yeah!

    so when are apple going to try and patent converting oxygen into co2 or vice versa

  18. Mick Stranahan
    WTF?

    If you can't

    remember where you parked you are clearly too stupid to be allowed out on the open road.

  19. G R Goslin

    Much simpler

    I've a much simpler system than that. I run a white Land Rover Defender. When I come back to the car park, I simply look for the large white object projecting above the multi-coloured array of boys toys.

  20. Niles
    Go

    Nice start…

    …but why stop at cars? How about my keys, my wallet, my sunglasses, the remote, the damn cat…

    1. TechnicianJack

      Re: Nice start…

      I believe this system has already been implemented for cats. There are several systems which you can strap to your cat which have a camera and a GPS module, allowing you to have a cat eye view and track where your cat has been/currently is.

      I suppose it's only a matter of time before Apple introduce the iCat tracker (Only works with Black or White cats. Please purchase a £400 compatibility pack if you have any other colour cat).

      1. MachDiamond Silver badge

        Re: Nice start…

        The iCat tracker would be dead useful for that cat that goes out thieving every night. Look for klepto cat on youtube. Bring clean undies, you're gonna sh!& yourself laughing.

  21. John H Woods
    Boffin

    I only lost my car once ...

    Wife dictated a shopping list of 11 items whilst I was hands free on mobile. I stopped at the shop - it's only a walk from the house but it was on the way home. Bought 11 items. Was sure I'd forgotten something but wife went through shopping and confirmed that my memory was indeed excellent. About 2 hours later I looked out of the window and wondered where the f*** the car was. Had to walk back to the shop so I could drive it home.

  22. JaitcH
    WTF?

    Back to the future? That's what I did in the '70's

    I used to roam all over God's half-acre in Northern Ontario, Canada where the winter temps frequently drop to minus 40 - it doesn't matter C or F as it was the same either way - and I used a remote to start the engine which needed 15 minutes to warm up the oil and the transmission.

    The remote gad another feature: it could sound the horn AND flash the headlights.

    I guess what I didn't realise was I needed Bluetooth (before it's time) and sensors buried in the car parks as well as a computer. Had one of those, either a PDP8 or PDP11. And I used for eyes and ears for location purposes.

    More Apple Tosh.

  23. TeeCee Gold badge
    Happy

    Best "lost car" cockup of all time.

    Told to me by a mate some years ago.

    He and some friends had decided to go to the British Grand Prix at Silverstone. Their cunning plan was to arrive early to beat the traffic and then leave as soon as the cars crossed the line to beat the traffic out.

    On arrival they were directed to overflow parking in a field. They carefully triangulated the car's position in the field from surrounding trees and such, on the (entirely correct) assumption that it would be a sea of cars when they returned. When the race finished they hared out to get the car.

    Problem: Which of the forty or so fields now full of cars in the surrounding countryside was the one in which they had triangulated their car's position? Solution: Wait 'til everyone else has gone, the correct field is the one with a car still in it.

    --

    Another one that made me laugh was one of the suits who went out on the lash while away on business in ${European_Capital). He got rather legless and took a taxi back to his hotel. The next day he went back to retrieve his Merc, to find it wasn't there. Police report, return to base, order new car and new laptop.

    A few days later he got a call from the police in ${European_Capital}, saying they'd found his car, undamaged, with all his belongings still in it. It was almost 100 meters from where he'd had it stolen from, or "exactly where he'd left it before getting trolleyed and forgetting about it" as we like to think of it.

  24. St3n
    FAIL

    So Apple have invented the tracker then..

    Had a tracker in my last car. Could alert me where it was in the car park & do other things too.

    I smell a law suit..

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