All Tesla Cars Being Produced Now Have Full Self-Driving Hardware • Hacker News Board

Re: All Tesla Cars Being Produced Now Have Full Self-Driving Hardware

#211

Post by Animats » Thu, Oct 20, 2016, 4:13 AM UTC

luma wrote: post #91

I think what people are missing here is an understanding of how these systems are tested and deployed at scale. While I have no involvement with Tesla I do have first-hand knowledge of similar programs at tier 1 automotive suppliers. The suppliers provide (or are looking to provide) an electronics suite to car manufacturers. The car manufacturers want the system to be safe lest they be sued out of existence. One part…

Of course, Tesla acts like it owns that data. Their privacy policy permits them to monitor your vehicle unless you opt out. But there's no reason you can't download that data yourself, if you can figure out how to do so.

Does anybody make an antenna-level middle box for GSM phones? Something you hook into the antenna cable as a firewall/monitor?

Re: All Tesla Cars Being Produced Now Have Full Self-Driving Hardware

#212

Post by prostoalex » Thu, Oct 20, 2016, 4:17 AM UTC

tmptmp wrote: post #198

PacketPaul wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pilot here. Airplanes have autopilot. While on autopilot you are still expected to be monitoring the flight and take control at a moments notice. Autopilot does not allow the pilot to take a nap or go in the back and party with the flight attendants. Autopilot is the correct term. I'm tired of always having to cater to the lowest common denominator.

>>Autopilot is the correct term. I'm tired of always having to cater to the lowest common denominator. Your argument fails as the analogy of car drivers with airplane pilots fails on various grounds. a. The airplanes, which provides autopilot facility, their pilots have to undergo more rigorous and stringent training than what a ordinary car driver has to undergo b. for different types of airplane autopilot systems t…

There are no specific requirements on avionics training. As long as you have been endorsed for a specific class and type of aircraft, you can fly one, even if the aircraft used for checkout had a different type of autopilot (or none at all).

Things obviously converge with more complex aircrafts, as it would be quite difficult to find, let's say, two Airbus A320 with drastically different stacks, but some of them, like Cessna 172 Skyhawk, have been in production since 1956, with aircraft technology making quite a progress in those 60 years.

If all your training has been done on a 1956 Cessna 172, is it wise to operate a 2016 model without sufficient training? No. Legal? Yes.

> Tesla does NOT put any requirement for more rigorous and stringent training for its drivers

Beyond saying "Don't take tour hands off the wheel and be prepared to take over any moment" what kind of training would you envision them offering outside of [insert state name] Driver's Handbook? Most states already offer free defensive driving courses as well.

Re: All Tesla Cars Being Produced Now Have Full Self-Driving Hardware

#213

Post by frik » Thu, Oct 20, 2016, 4:23 AM UTC

Animats wrote: post #99

More cameras. Better sonars (very short range). Better radar processing, but apparently the same old single radar at bumper height. Still no windshield-height radar. No radar scanning in elevation. No LIDAR. That's a better, but still weak sensor suite. It's probably enough for freeway driving under good conditions. It's far below Google's sensor suite. Or Volvo's. Now they just have to write software smart enough to…

It's staggering that Tesla don't use LIDAR at all.

Sure LIDAR is more expensive but the data quality is very stable and good. Cameras won't work that well or at all in night or when the sun rays blend in morning / evening or in bad weather conditions like heavy rain or snow. All other self-driving cars I know of have at least a small LIDAR beside several other types of sensors.

Re: All Tesla Cars Being Produced Now Have Full Self-Driving Hardware

#214

Post by 2bitencryption » Thu, Oct 20, 2016, 4:25 AM UTC

ams6110 wrote: post #134

blhack wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whoa...reading that doesn't rub me the right way at all . I trust Tesla, though, so maybe I'm misreading/misinterpreting it.

Why do you trust Tesla? In what ways are their interests aligned with yours?

Why would you not trust Tesla? Are their interests not aligned with yours?

Re: All Tesla Cars Being Produced Now Have Full Self-Driving Hardware

#215

Post by ovao » Thu, Oct 20, 2016, 4:26 AM UTC

hash-set wrote: post #188

toomuchtodo wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But not being able to USE your car for some things? That just screams easy headlines and it's a reason I might not get a Tesla in the future. Its your car. It's Tesla software. You don't own it, just like you don't own any of the other commercial software you use. I can't really find fault in it; they deserve the lion's share of the revenue (not Uber, Lyft, or you) if you put the vehicle into their shared rideshari…

I don't really buy into the software licensing bs--it was forced on us without any choices. It is the worst kind of legal bs there is. "You paid for this but you have no rights to it." Uh, yeah, keep thinking that.

A Tesla is not forced upon you, however. If you're wary of the terms, do not buy a Tesla car.

Software has, by the way, always* been this way. I've been "buying software" for twenty years and I've never actually not gotten a license with it rather than the software itself, with all ownership rights conferred to me.

*within the scope of my knowledge and experience

Re: All Tesla Cars Being Produced Now Have Full Self-Driving Hardware

#216

Post by Animats » Thu, Oct 20, 2016, 4:27 AM UTC

jayjay71 wrote: post #149

maratd wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That's a better, but still weak sensor suite. All you have is two overlapping cameras with poor resolution and they let you behind the wheel, right? This is a software and processing hardware problem only . Human beings drive OK for the most part and we don't have lidar/radar/sonar/etc. With 8 cameras providing 360 vision and an advanced NVIDIA hardware suite, this problem is entirely solvable and this is a very re…

In theory, sure. But you're effectively saying computers have to process vision as well as humans, which some experts think is comparable to solving AI. I'm not saying Tesla won't make a lot of progress, but considering how many decades of research has gone into this very problem (I worked on it at Carnegie Mellon as a graduate student, and they've been doing it since the 80's) it will likely take longer than most pe…

Google is at stage 3 and getting close to stage 4 for slow (At higher speeds, prediction becomes more of an issue. Will that car on the side street drive into the intersection, or not? At slow speeds, you can wait and see what they do. At higher speeds, you have to predict behavior. That's hard, but a machine learning problem.

Re: All Tesla Cars Being Produced Now Have Full Self-Driving Hardware

#217

Post by seanmcdirmid » Thu, Oct 20, 2016, 4:28 AM UTC

phire wrote: post #196

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that most consumers, like parent poster, do not really understand what pilots do, or that an autopilot simply holds the course steady (in the simplest form, at least). Combine ignorance with misguided self-righteousness, and we get...this mess.

Not to mention, plane autopilots don't have to worry about traffic.

The pilots still do, though.

Re: All Tesla Cars Being Produced Now Have Full Self-Driving Hardware

#218

Post by mabbo » Thu, Oct 20, 2016, 4:28 AM UTC

hash-set wrote: post #176

I get that tech companies want self-driving cars really bad because they smell billions of dollars in "disruption" but no matter how good AI gets, I have a suspicion it won't actually do better than a decent human driver can do. It's not about processing speed, it's about experience and reflexes, which granted, not everyone has. Let's see a self-driving car win a Formula 1 race--and even that controlled racetrack env…

Computers don't have fatigue. Ever driven for 12 hours? I have. I was so exhausted, I couldn't tell how much of safety hazard I was to everyone else. Humans fuck up like that.

Even if computers can only match humans at skill level, they will be at the skill level 100% of the time, no directions. (And they will probably exceed us in skill anyways)

Car accidents don't happen because people lack skill nearly as often as because people aren't at their best for just a moment. That's why autonomous cars will be safer.

Re: All Tesla Cars Being Produced Now Have Full Self-Driving Hardware

#219

Post by mjevans » Thu, Oct 20, 2016, 4:29 AM UTC

Dangeranger wrote: post #207

luma wrote: post #91

I think what people are missing here is an understanding of how these systems are tested and deployed at scale. While I have no involvement with Tesla I do have first-hand knowledge of similar programs at tier 1 automotive suppliers. The suppliers provide (or are looking to provide) an electronics suite to car manufacturers. The car manufacturers want the system to be safe lest they be sued out of existence. One part…

Question: Does the fact that the collection of the required volume of kms driven is performed over a shorter period of time based on a higher number of test subjects collecting the data impact the diversity and quality of the data negatively? Said another way: Is there a downside to parallelizing the collection process across a broader horizontal population of collection vehicles over a shorter period versus the trad…

The only obvious downside to an outside observer is that they will find it difficult to collect 'all weather' data in substantial volume in less than approximately a single year.

From the positive side, they will collect and be able to evaluate a much /wider/ range of driving data from a far larger set. They are much more likely to run across 'better morons' both in operators of the Tesla and in operators of other cars.

Re: All Tesla Cars Being Produced Now Have Full Self-Driving Hardware

#220

Post by dogma1138 » Thu, Oct 20, 2016, 4:30 AM UTC

berberous wrote: post #204

dogma1138 wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes for example the autofocus for portrait mode for the 7 Plus was introduced with 10.1 http://www.pocket-lint.com/news/138914-iphone-7-plus-owners-... There were also another thing or 2 that came in 10.3 iirc.

You're mistaken. Yes, portrait mode on the 7+ was introduced in 10.1 on the 7+ rather than at launch. But this feature was never available on the 6. It requires the two cameras in the 7+ to create a depth map and then blur the distance. Nothing to do with autofocus. There's no feature that was removed other than the headphone jack.

Well IIRC the portrait mode was absent completely from the 7+ camera app.

This is analogous to the Tesla example, new hardware no software.

The fact that the 7+ has a different portrait mode doesn't matter, the app had none, and in this case the new Tesla comes with new hardware that provides a different and arguably better "autopilot" but the software would trail the release of the hardware.