Death to the Trapezoid... Next USB Connector Will Be Reversible 408
TheRealHocusLocus writes "Extreme bandwidth is nice, intelligent power management is cool... but folks should be spilling into the streets in thankful praise that the next generation miniature USB connector will fit either way. All told — just how many intricate miracle devices have been scrapped in their prime — because a tiny USB port was mangled? For millennia untold chimpanzees and people have been poking termite mounds with round sticks. I for one am glad to see round stick technology make its way into consumer electronics. Death to the trapezoid, bring back the rectangle! So... since we're on roll here... how many other tiny annoyances that lead to big fails are out there?"
The new connector will be smaller too.
fit both ways (Score:5, Funny)
Re:fit both ways (Score:5, Funny)
Re:fit both ways (Score:5, Funny)
Ruins the sanctity of cabling.
No, it's all natural when the cabling is born that way. If you want to see ruined sanctity, ram a current USB plug in the wrong way...
But I say this is only the first step. Next we must eradicate male - female difference, and have just one plug-socket which will fit, work and feel good no matter how you do the coupling.
Re:fit both ways (Score:4, Funny)
That's immoral
Only if you are a religious bigot.
I actually believe that all sets of cabling should be treated the same. I object to bigots telling me that I shouldn't stick a USB connector into an SAE AS 50151 B [sae.org] 500 amp connector.
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This Charles guy had a fancy name for the result of such an experiment: Natural Selection.
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Aside from the fact that you have that precisely backwards, that's correct.
From the column you linked to written by Florian Mueller (not exactly an Open-Source evangelist):
Small Connectors (Score:3, Insightful)
Big fails? How about small connectors? I greatly prefer regular-sized USB to micro-USB, they sit much better in the slot.
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Not when the device you're trying to connect is smaller than said port!
Re:Small Connectors (Score:5, Funny)
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Sigh. This happened to me a week ago. Tried to hook up a USB-B connector to the back of a laserprinter blind. It fit in but wouldn't be detected by the host computer at all. The computer was running Linux Mint so I thought it was a compatibility problem (even though I just moved the printer from another computer running the exact same version of Linux Mint).
After 20 minutes I decided to turn the printer around and noticed (for the first time) that a USB-B connector would quite easily fit snugly into an
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I've never understood this. Same with HDMI/DVI. Why can HD-SDI transmit 2k uncompressed video and 16 channels of audio easily over a 200m reel of coax cable, yet HDMI wont go any further than 10m.
Re:Small Connectors (Score:5, Funny)
I greatly prefer regular-sized USB to micro-USB, they sit much better in the slot.
oh, c'mon, that is SO what she said!
Atari would be proud (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Atari would be proud (Score:5, Interesting)
Yes, Atari had a serial bus that was quite nice in its day. Too bad they didn't promote it as a standard for other computer makers of the day to use. There are some significant parallels to USB, as well as many differences.
But what really sets it apart from USB is the lack of standardization, not technical differences. USB was part of a vision for all computers. Atari never considered pushing SIO for use with Apple or Commodore.
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Meh. SIO could not be hot-plugged, did not auto-load drivers, could not be hubbed, etc. It was almost, but not entirely, completely unlike USB.
I'm sure the idea of "easy to use serial bus" was inspired by his work with SIO, but then one has to consider AppleBus, ABD, A.b and many other similar designs from many other similar companies.
Re:Atari would be proud (Score:5, Informative)
No one is saying SIO is USB, just it shared some DNA and a designer. On your feature list, Hot plugging, no. Auto-load drivers, yes it could. Some of the modems used that. Hubbed? Sort of. Atari didn't release anything but third parties did such as the Quintopus that turned one SIO into 5. http://nleaudio.com/css/products.htm [nleaudio.com]
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Surely Commodore was first with its floppy disks/printers.
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Re:Atari would be proud (Score:5, Insightful)
Barrel connectors on brick power supplies (Score:2)
Re:Barrel connectors on brick power supplies (Score:5, Insightful)
A lot of times, that's by design. If the laptop is jerked, you'd want it to become disconnected rather than stay plugged in and risk mangling the plug (or worse, the receiving port).
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The same answer still applies - pulling out is preferable to damage to the device, cable, wall wart, or prongs.
another design cue from apple? (Score:3)
Reminds me of the notebook's keyboard position, then the trackpad, then the clean designs etc etc...
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The notebook computer's keyboard position... on the inside?
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No. Before, notebooks had the keyboard farther from the screen, touching the device's borders. Apple came with the idea of a palm rest, AFAIR.
Some even had printers after the keyboard, like this one:
http://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/rms/computerweekly/photogalleries/233641/194_20_dan-darcys-1993-canon-bj-notebook-bn22.jpg [ttgtmedia.com]
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Rubbish. Laptops had trackballs in front of the keyboards long before Apple added a touchpad to their powerbooks.
Re:another design cue from apple? (Score:5, Informative)
Wrong. From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_laptops [wikipedia.org]
The Apple PowerBook series, introduced in October 1991, pioneered changes that are now de facto standards on laptops, such as room for a palm rest, and the inclusion of a pointing device (a trackball).
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Even more: Later PowerBooks featured optional color displays (PowerBook 165c, 1993), and first true touchpad (PowerBook 500 series, 1994), first 16-bit stereo audio, and first built-in Ethernet network adapter (PowerBook 500, 1994).
Re:another design cue from apple? (Score:4, Interesting)
Cue the anti-Lightning connector posts.
The proprietary nature of Lightning and its excessive control by Apple is bad, but as a functional connector it works pretty well. I can plug my phone in without being able to see anything and thusfar it has been plenty durable, too. (My Proclip car charger/holder uses a lightning/30pin cable in the base, so it gets pretty hard use without any issues).
I think Apple would have been smart to create a cheap licensing program for it to gain wider adoption, especially for devices that aren't phones or tablets, as well as a more open spec that would have allowed for more innovative use with iPhones for third party components. Now that a USB spec is coming that eliminates the mechanical advantage of Lightning as a plug, the proprietary nature of of Lightning will be more glaring.
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then the trackpad, then the clean designs etc etc...
.. then the addition of indiscernible hieroglyphics. "No mom, the thing that looks like a crooked T... next to the clover.... thing.. " That's one cue I'm glad as hell never got released into the PC space. For all of Apple's touted wisdom, they do some equally idiotic things sometimes just to "be different".
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I have in my lenovo three indiscernible hieroglyphs: one that turns out to be the old-generation of the windows logo, one that engages the right click on the mouse (why?), and one called Alt-Gr. It seems that Microsoft took what was bad, made it worse and it is now a standard. Never mind the rest of incomprehensible bullshit I have on this keyboard, like "fn" in blue, but also the whole enter key in blue. Or keys for page back and page forth, right next to the up arrow. Or....
Nah, I am fine with the alt key
Even worse... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Even worse... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Even worse... (Score:5, Funny)
I find if I go to plug in a USB connector, it's best to change your mind at the last minute and turn it over because you're *always* wrong first time.
Unfortunately, the only times that I would not be wrong the first time are the times I do this. There is no way to win.
Re:Even worse... (Score:5, Funny)
That is what you get for using a Universal Schrodinger Bus connector.
Re:Even worse... (Score:5, Funny)
It's a practical application of the Monty Hall Problem
Re:Even worse... (Score:5, Funny)
Damn it, Jim, a spin-1/2 connector!
USB connections are quantum entangled. At the other side of the wormhole there's a reality where you've spent your entire life getting the usb in in the first try.
In that reality you're rich and powerful.
Re:Even worse... (Score:5, Funny)
USB plugs only fit in after they are observed, Before that, they are in superposition. See http://www.funnyjunk.com/funny_pictures/4555650/The+Quantum+state+of+a+USB/ [funnyjunk.com] for an explanation.
The ancient future awaits! (Score:5, Funny)
Is the fact that the standard USB connection (rectangle) is not really 180 degrees symmetric (despite a shape that indicates it should be), usually takes 3+ attempts to get it in. Damn it, Jim, a spin-1/2 connector!
Protip: The USB emblem goes "up". The logo is trademarked, and without it the cables are too frustrating to use. An interesting feat of human engineering indeed.
Now, let us travel through time far enough into the future that we come to appreciate the greatest connector design possible:
First, consider the connector with zero lines of symmetry, such as USB, or a polarized pronged plug. There is a 2D plane that the connector travels orthogonal to and which it must breech in order to complete a connection docking sequence. Consider this plane slicing through your connector and receptacle's contacts. Note that there is one receptacle surface for one connector pin passing through the docking plane.
To the Future! Copy and rotate your receptor 180 degrees in place along the docking plane. Eliminate any conflicting isolation surfaces, and move the pins such that they do not interact with each the other's connection surfaces. Now you have a reversible connector with one line of symmetry in the receptacle. The connector pins can occupy both sets of receptacle contact surfaces, but need only occupy one position to complete the electrical circuits.
Advance! Now we will perform the same step again, but with a 90 degree increment. Behold! A square connector!
60 degrees? Hexagonal connectors! Note that just imagining it we can nearly taste the hex filled future!
Onward, to 45 degrees, and to victory! Octagonal connections even mirror our futurist desire to slice the corners from our square UI windows, and tabs.
Oh integration, you foul beast. Clearly to see furthest into the future we must have infinite lines of symmetry in our docking plane -- BUT HOW?! With all pins occupying all positions across the USB connector, the left side interacts with the right side. Since connector pins need only exist in one position we need only make the connector pins have zero lines of symmetry -- move all the connector pins to one side. Simultaneously we have a perfectly round receptacle -- Ah, but all intersecting isolation surfaces are removed, this leaves us with only a flat ring of contacts and several pins.
So, now we will enter a new Dimension! We can stretch the docking plane in the 3rd dimension along the orthogonal connection axis! BEHOLD! We have discovered the most futuristic connector of all time! The Head Phone Jack!
Now, what's old can finally be new again. Story time is over, now get off my lawn.
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All of the USB ports on the front and back of my computer are sideways, and don't get me started on USB flash drives.
Re:Even worse... (Score:5, Insightful)
Obviously, you've never tried plugging a USB cable into the back of a tower that can't easily be moved (with a lot of connections in the back, it's rather difficult to move unless all of your wires are long). The plugs are sideways. What's up and what's down?
Equally, for micro/mini USB, have you ever tried plugging in your phone in the dark, when it's yelling at you about needing to be charged? For that matter, those connectors are TINY. Can you read anything written on them?
Reversible connectors -- or connectors with an actual OBVIOUS direction -- would be very nice.
Re:Even worse... (Score:5, Funny)
Equally, for micro/mini USB, have you ever tried plugging in your phone in the dark,
The process goes something like: gently push. Doesn't work. wiggle a bit. Still doesn't work. Flip over and try again. Neither of those work either. Then repeat a little bit harder until eventually it goes in or breaks.
Fun fact: apparently on the nexus 5 you can jam in the connector upside down quite easily!
Things you do in the dark (Score:5, Funny)
The process goes something like: gently push. Doesn't work. wiggle a bit. Still doesn't work. Flip over and try again. Neither of those work either. Then repeat a little bit harder until eventually it goes in or breaks.
Wait, we're still talking about USB ports here, right?
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Flash drives often don't have any USB logo. Some of mine have writing on the logo side and some have writing on the other side or both.
The port on my phone is upside down, so that the USB logo faces the back of the phone.
The users aren't the only people who don't bother to think.
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You aren't making sense. No fancy hardware is required for a reversible connector. Put a full set of contacts on the top edge of the connector, put a full set of contacts on the bottom edge. Take all the same cables going to the top, split them, and connect them left to right instead of right to left.
Maybe you are talking about a reversible cable, which is different. Even then we have ethernet cables and whatnot, so it is just handled by having send and receive lines criss cross going to the other connector
and Just after (Score:5, Interesting)
Nitpick (Score:2)
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There is no full-size Type-C connector, and the press release explicitly lists phones and tablets as the target.
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Feel free to rate my post into the basement for stupidity...
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Eh, it happens.
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The next version of the USB connector will accept the plug either way up, the USB 3.0 Promoter Group said Tuesday. The USB Type-C connector, initially intended for USB 3.1 and 2.0 devices, will be a complete redesign, the group said.
Video output too (Score:2)
The spec explicitly includes video output now. I know MHL and the like have become almost de facto standards but this will finalise it. Basically you've got all the advantages of the Lightning connector in a standardised design. I liked Lightning when it came out, but score one for universality.
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The spec explicitly includes video output now. I know MHL and the like have become almost de facto standards but this will finalise it. Basically you've got all the advantages of the Lightning connector in a standardised design. I liked Lightning when it came out, but score one for universality.
So just save all that work and imcompatibility with Apple devices and use Lightning? Unless there are improvements in this new design over Lightning, then you are just reinventing the wheel.
There will be patent holders on the new design as well.
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If Apple was licencing Lightning to anybody but manufacturers of accessories for Apple products you'd be onto something. By comparison the USB-IF exists to get as many people using USB as possible without ceding administrative control.
USB cables are 4 dimensional (Score:5, Funny)
Apologies if this appears twice. It looks like slashdot ate the first attempt.
Re:USB cables are 4 dimensional (Score:5, Informative)
In human society we have this thing called "humour", and one of its functions is to obviate the stress of common irritations by acknowledging them in an ironic or unexpected fashion, such that the next encounter with the irritant brings the joke to mind and is therefore less irksome. If your own society hasn't reached that level of nuance yet I dare say it is you, sir, who is the ape.
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"So... the fact that people is proof that USB cables are 4-dimensional?
No, seriously. I must be the only human being alive who . I guess those reports about being well behind the rest of the world in education must be true if the rest of my country , and I'll bet the apes figure it out before do."
Fixed that for you.
Poka-Yoke (Score:2)
Someone finally sat down and studied Yoka-yoke [wikipedia.org] design principles.
Problem in Europe? (Score:2)
Now that Europe is mandating the existing micro-USB for all phones are they going to modify the mandate to include this connector or is it too late for that and Europeans will not be able to enjoy this marvelous new connector?
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Given that it's acceptable for a manufacturer to simply sell an adaptor for the device, I don't think it's going to be an issue.
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I noticed that my old throwaway Tracfones all had 2.5mm headphones jacks, but all higher-end tablets/phones I've seen use 3.5mm jacks... I know the 3.5mm is much more universal but the 2.5mm standard is already there, with plenty of adapters for 3.5mm devices, any time someone wants to make a slightly thinner device.
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headphone jack. hmmm. inherently shorting!
as you insert or remove, the ground (larger band) shorts to the other contacts and for amps (and worse, psu's!) this is horrible.
I first learned this when I was building a diy bipolar (plus and minus) psu. I need a 3 conductor connector. hey, 1/4" phones jack has 3! so I used it.
took the box into work and it was immediately pointed out to me that for power use, it was really bad! yet I can remember audio alchemy (long gone company but they were well known once
Don't think of them as annoyances... (Score:2)
It's about time (Score:3)
Connectors that are (un)plugged often should either be symmetrical or clearly indexed. The original (big) USB plug was almost right (in the sense that the plug wouldn't go in the wrong way), except that it was difficult to tell which way the index should be facing. Firewire was a decent implementation of an indexed plug.
The current micro USB plugs are ridiculous, though. It can takes three tries to plug it in and every time you get it wrong you stress the socket a little. The difference in feel between a correct and incorrect fit is very mushy with some plugs/sockets.
While we're on the subject, a pure rectangle (a la the USB A plug) is even worse. The USB connector design over the years has been so bad that I wouldn't be too hopeful about what they come up with next.
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I don't know how, but when plugging a USB A plug it usually takes me more than two tries to get it in. USB B is easier because the plug orientation is more visually apparent.
Mini-B is less troublesome than Micro-B, which is really hard to work with in low light for old farts like me with presbyopia.
Just great.. (Score:2)
It's not easy to pug the connector in upside down, so if someone forces it in in the wrong direction and breaks it, it's not the fault of the connector.
What will I do (Score:2)
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Keep using them for the umpteen devices that you already use them with?
Who's the lotto winner cashing in on this patent? (Score:2)
US Patent Pending
A Method To Allow Device Insertions In Any Orientation
A device being any device that can be held in the hand between two fingers, too large to be grasped by two fingers yet small enough to be grasped by the whole hand, or too large to be grasped by a hand, an insertion being a process by which a device is brought close to another larger device with a receptacle and the first device placed into the receptacle to facilitate mutual operation, and orientation being the angular position of
And it will break... (Score:2)
... as easily as the current microUSB connector?
Safely remove device (Score:2)
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That's not a USB issue, that's an OS write caching issue. It's higher up the chain of command.
Re:Safely remove device (Score:4, Informative)
(Protip: write caching is off by default in modern Windows, so you can actually just yank the USB stick when it finishes what it's doing without ill effect.)
What about HDMI (Score:5, Interesting)
The WORST connectors are the trapezoidal HDMI connectors. Not only are they orientation specific, but they are often used on heavy cables that pull on the connector causing it to lose contact, and even bend the pins in the socket.
Add in the fact that the data rate is like a zillion bytes per second and there is an encryption handshake that must go just right at the start and you have a clusterfuck.
HDMI connectors seriously need an upgrade.
What's wrong with good old TRS plugs? (Score:4, Interesting)
Tip-{ring,ring,...}-Sleeve. Easily handles the 3 or 4 connectors needs for just about any modern digital serial connector. Need power? why not modulate the signal on top of the power carrier? Easy to connect, proven reliable (can't count how many times I've broken a mini/micro USB or worse those umpteen pin pico/nano pin connectors that are only used for power or maybe a simple serial connection)
Simple solution (Score:3)
Let the British design the next standard. I have yet to see anyone pick up a BS 1363 [wikipedia.org] and not figure out which way to insert it.
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Europeans have. Every time they plug something into a power outlet.
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Um, dude, US/North American power plugs traditionally have been the same. Today most plugs have grounds or polarization that prevents them from being reversed, but theoretically they still can reversed.
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Not in the UK. Our plugs are very well designed. Even the sockets include covers over the power holes which can only be retracted by inserting the (Slightly longer) earth pin first.
Re:Doesn't Apple have a patent on this? (Score:5, Funny)
Very well designed until you step on one in bare feet, anway.
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You really think that those are well designed? It looks like russian solution for me. While it's harder to die from an electric shock, one can easily kill somebody else with such plug :-)
Re:Doesn't Apple have a patent on this? (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, they are well designed. Compare to them to the standard EU and US designs which are flimsy, often left to be self-supporting (which they fail at), and have a tendency to just fall out of the sockets in my experience. A UK plug is solid when plugged in, makes an earth connection before a live/neutral connection as it is plugged in, disconnects the live/neutral before the earth is disconnected, and as the poster stated has a shuttered outlet so that the socket is only opened *after* an earth connection has been made. If you think that is a "russian solution" then maybe you think good engineering is communist, and flimsy make do is the american way.
Re:Apple All Over Again (Score:5, Insightful)
Unlike Lightning, this is just a connector for USB 2/3, not a whole new interface. A dumb, cheap adaptor should suffice. (Unlike Lightning to 30-pin adaptors which are basically tiny protocol droids translating between the two.)
Re:Apple All Over Again (Score:4, Interesting)
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afaik the device is compliant as long as there's a converter for the device..
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And yet, during the hysteria few months ago about the iPhone charger that electrocuted a customer in China, Apple kept insisting people needed, oh they badly needed, to buy only Apple's branded cable. The shock risk was entirely in what the cable was plugged into, but they insisted otherwise, and it's doubtless
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I tell you, Apple marketeers are absolute genius. That first they can say "branded cable" with a straight face, and that consumers actually buy into it... it's an amazing thing.
Re:Apple All Over Again (Score:4, Funny)
Unlike Lightning, this is just a connector for USB 2/3, not a whole new interface. A dumb, cheap adaptor should suffice. (Unlike Lightning to 30-pin adaptors which are basically tiny protocol droids translating between the two.)
The image I get in my head is a miniature C-3P0 inside the connector talking very quickly.
Re:Apple All Over Again (Score:5, Funny)
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The image I get in my head is a miniature C-3P0 inside the connector talking very quickly.
Don't you mean "C-3P0 talking slightly slower than he normally does"?
After all, even USB 3.1 is only 10Gbps.
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There is no silicon between the two devices if you're using USB over the Lightning connector, that's the point - early on in its life, someone tore the cables apart and the data lines are wired straight through, the authentication chip can only communicate with the iPhone and then only at speeds slower than USB 1.1 Low Speed.
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Maybe not as bad as that, but a new USB connector does mean yet another USB cable to carry in your go-bag. I already carry four different kinds.
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Cost. What's acceptable on a $1000 laptop is not affordable for $100 tablets.
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Re:Wow, what a great idea! (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh right, from Apple.
You mean the Apple who helped pioneer the first USB connector which everyone hates so much. Seriously people have been whining about the USB connector from about day 1 and reversible/rotationally symmetric connectors have existed for even longer.
To claim Apple "invented" the idea of a reversible USB connector is utterly just plain silly. Even if you claim it is invention to do something blindingly obvious, you'll be disappointed to hear that Nokia's DKU2 cable was (a) reversible (b) carried USB and (c) existed on the 2002 eara Nokia 6100, a full 5 years before even the first generation iPhone and a year before the iPod's reversible connector supported USB.
So no, it's not an invention and even if it was Nokia had it before Apple.
Seriously what is it with Apple Fanbois assuming they invented everything? You know it's possible to enjoy their products *without* having to make up random shit about how they did everything first.