Patent ID: 11948561
Assignee: APPLE INC.
Field: Computer technology (Electrical engineering)
Classification: CPC G | IPC G

Claim 8:
9. An audio system comprising:
a headphone having an accelerometer and at least one microphone integrated therein;
at least one processor; and
memory having stored therein instructions which when executed by the at least one processor cause the system to
receive, while the headphone is being worn by a wearer, 1) an accelerometer signal from the accelerometer and 2) a microphone signal from the at least one microphone that is arranged to capture sound of an environment in which the wearer is located,
generate a voice activity detection (VAD) signal based on the accelerometer signal,
store the VAD signal in a buffer,
process the microphone signal to detect a key-phrase, wherein at least some of the key-phrase is detected within a microphone time interval of the microphone signal,
retrieve a portion of the VAD signal from the buffer, wherein the portion of the VAD signal was generated from a portion of the accelerometer signal that is within the microphone time interval,
determine whether the portion of the VAD signal indicates that the key-phrase is spoken by the wearer of the headphone, and
responsive to a determination that the portion of the VAD signal indicates that the key-phrase is spoken by the wearer of the headphone, trigger a virtual personal assistant
wherein the accelerometer and the microphone are always active while the headphone is worn by the wearer such that the accelerometer signal and the microphone signal are continuously received.