Former Tesla Firmware Engineer Discusses the System • Hacker News Board

Re: Former Tesla Firmware Engineer Discusses the System

#21

Post by TarpitCarnivore » Fri, Aug 24, 2018, 5:44 PM UTC

sz4kerto wrote: post #8

Why is this interesting or surprising? Of course almost all challengers have hacky tech under the hood because they don't have the resources. Winning from that position is possible not because of generally better tech but by delivering something that the incumbents don't. Remember the demo of the first iPhone (vs the huge expertise of Nokia). Or how Microsoft won the desktop starting from a single user, cooperative m…

These are cars first and foremost. They should not be given a hand waive over "break things and move fast".

Re: Former Tesla Firmware Engineer Discusses the System

#22

Post by Retric » Fri, Aug 24, 2018, 5:44 PM UTC

Jtsummers wrote: post #10

Re QA: To quote Dodge (via Deming), "You can not inspect quality into a product." This poster seems to think well of the QA team they had. However, It doesn't matter how great your QA team is, if the quality isn't in the system the QA team can't put it there. All they can do is tell you that you're making poor quality products, and attempt to inform management (as QA rarely has real authority) who should then act on…

QA done well is more than testing. It's managing risk and ensuring the process matches your risk tolerance. Car entertainment systems and Car breaking systems can be handled differently because the results of failure are different.

Re: Former Tesla Firmware Engineer Discusses the System

#23

Post by claydavisss » Fri, Aug 24, 2018, 5:44 PM UTC

I do not want a car that someone I've never met can "ssh" into, or any other remote access method.

Think I will be holding on to my ten year-old car as long as possible.

Re: Former Tesla Firmware Engineer Discusses the System

#24

Post by frozenport » Fri, Aug 24, 2018, 5:45 PM UTC

dswalter wrote: post #16

sz4kerto wrote: post #8

Why is this interesting or surprising? Of course almost all challengers have hacky tech under the hood because they don't have the resources. Winning from that position is possible not because of generally better tech but by delivering something that the incumbents don't. Remember the demo of the first iPhone (vs the huge expertise of Nokia). Or how Microsoft won the desktop starting from a single user, cooperative m…

Cars weigh thousands of pounds and routinely drive upwards of 60 miles per hour. The success of the first iPhone or Facebook app didn't depend on using it to navigate through life-and-death situations not only for the users but also for everyone around them. There are places for 'move fast and break things'. But cars move fast already, and they can really break things.

Hacks and safety aren't exclusive. You can have a hacked together system that is also safe.

Re: Former Tesla Firmware Engineer Discusses the System

#25

Post by lowry » Fri, Aug 24, 2018, 5:47 PM UTC

oxymoron wrote: post #14

sz4kerto wrote: post #8

Why is this interesting or surprising? Of course almost all challengers have hacky tech under the hood because they don't have the resources. Winning from that position is possible not because of generally better tech but by delivering something that the incumbents don't. Remember the demo of the first iPhone (vs the huge expertise of Nokia). Or how Microsoft won the desktop starting from a single user, cooperative m…

Remember the Toyota uncontrolled acceleration bug and the report that came as a result of the trial. It seems like software is a bit of a second thought for some incumbents too.

It is common knowledge that Toyota uncontrolled acceleration bug was completely imaginary, see for example http://revisionisthistory.com/episodes/08-blame-game

Re: Former Tesla Firmware Engineer Discusses the System

#26

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Aug 24, 2018, 5:48 PM UTC

sz4kerto wrote: post #8

Why is this interesting or surprising? Of course almost all challengers have hacky tech under the hood because they don't have the resources. Winning from that position is possible not because of generally better tech but by delivering something that the incumbents don't. Remember the demo of the first iPhone (vs the huge expertise of Nokia). Or how Microsoft won the desktop starting from a single user, cooperative m…

[deleted]

Re: Former Tesla Firmware Engineer Discusses the System

#27

Post by SideburnsOfDoom » Fri, Aug 24, 2018, 5:49 PM UTC

mikeash wrote: post #20

dswalter wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cars weigh thousands of pounds and routinely drive upwards of 60 miles per hour. The success of the first iPhone or Facebook app didn't depend on using it to navigate through life-and-death situations not only for the users but also for everyone around them. There are places for 'move fast and break things'. But cars move fast already, and they can really break things.

Tesla’s infotainment and IT infrastructure is unrelated to their safety. If this guy worked on motor control or braking system firmware then that would be scary, but he didn’t.

> Tesla’s infotainment and IT infrastructure is unrelated to their safety.

Only if it's deliberately isolated in the vehicle. It should be. Aaaand, it isn't: the firmware upgrades to all other car computing elements go through it.

Re: Former Tesla Firmware Engineer Discusses the System

#28

Post by toomuchtodo » Fri, Aug 24, 2018, 5:49 PM UTC

mikeash wrote: post #20

dswalter wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cars weigh thousands of pounds and routinely drive upwards of 60 miles per hour. The success of the first iPhone or Facebook app didn't depend on using it to navigate through life-and-death situations not only for the users but also for everyone around them. There are places for 'move fast and break things'. But cars move fast already, and they can really break things.

Tesla’s infotainment and IT infrastructure is unrelated to their safety. If this guy worked on motor control or braking system firmware then that would be scary, but he didn’t.

Ignoring the infotainment system for this argument (as they firewall it off from CANBUS and other life critical systems [1]), I argue that their IT infrastructure is safety related, as it governs Tesla's velocity in getting patches and security fixes out to vehicles in a timely manner.

Can you imagine a zero day being found in Windows with Windows Update being down?

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KX_0c9R4Fng

Re: Former Tesla Firmware Engineer Discusses the System

#29

Post by mandeepj » Fri, Aug 24, 2018, 5:50 PM UTC

ddevault wrote: post #11

I used to work at SpaceX on the team that did a piece of software called "WarpDrive". It was a massive monolithic ASP.NET application, with large swaths done with ASP.NET WebForms and a slow frontier of ASP.NET MVC gradually growing when I was working there. This application was responsible for practically everything that ran the factory: inventory, supply chain management, cost analysis, etc. Elon is a big Windows f…

> This application was responsible for practically everything that ran the factory: inventory, supply chain management, cost analysis, etc.

They could have bought something off the shelf. Not sure what was the value in building everything from scratch

Re: Former Tesla Firmware Engineer Discusses the System

#30

Post by Avshalom » Fri, Aug 24, 2018, 5:50 PM UTC

sz4kerto wrote: post #8

Why is this interesting or surprising? Of course almost all challengers have hacky tech under the hood because they don't have the resources. Winning from that position is possible not because of generally better tech but by delivering something that the incumbents don't. Remember the demo of the first iPhone (vs the huge expertise of Nokia). Or how Microsoft won the desktop starting from a single user, cooperative m…

because about twice a thread some one claims Tesla Has A Software Culture as a reason that GM or Toyota or VW won't ever be able to compete with them.