A patent application submitted by Apple last year — and made public just this morning — describes a flexible, magnetically attached cover for a tablet device. It’s similar to Apple’s existing smart cover for the iPad, except that this cover can also function as an input and display device. And one of the concepts described by Apple in the patent filing is an idea for using the cover as a keyboard.

The end result looks very similar to the signature feature of Microsoft’s Surface tablet computer.

via Apple patent filing looks a lot like Microsoft Surface – GeekWire.