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Openpilot – open-source self-driving agent

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Re: Openpilot – open-source self-driving agent

#91

Post by burtonator »

kyle_martin1 wrote: post #25

I work as a lead autonomous vehicle engineer. Here's a few thoughts: * This isn't really open-source. The most important part, the neural network perception pipeline, is closed sourced. Without the training data and the network architectures, the supporting code is not that useful. * This system is non-deterministic, which is a no-no in critical systems like autonomous vehicle. There's no guarantee that vehicle detec…

> Without the training data

Big data engineer here...

This is what a LOT of open source hackers don't understand about modern systems.

It's all about the data.

Most "futuristic" technologies that we're going to see in down the road are going to be built using absolutely massive data sets.

Data sets that aren't in the public domain.

This effectively locks out hackers and open source enthusiasts and means that only companies like Facebook, Google, and Amazon get to play with all the cool toys.

Re: Openpilot – open-source self-driving agent

#92

Post by austinkeller »

burtonator wrote: post #91
kyle_martin1 wrote: post #25

I work as a lead autonomous vehicle engineer. Here's a few thoughts: * This isn't really open-source. The most important part, the neural network perception pipeline, is closed sourced. Without the training data and the network architectures, the supporting code is not that useful. * This system is non-deterministic, which is a no-no in critical systems like autonomous vehicle. There's no guarantee that vehicle detec…

> Without the training data Big data engineer here... This is what a LOT of open source hackers don't understand about modern systems. It's all about the data. Most "futuristic" technologies that we're going to see in down the road are going to be built using absolutely massive data sets. Data sets that aren't in the public domain. This effectively locks out hackers and open source enthusiasts and means that only com…

Open data isn't glorified to the same degree as open source is by the common hacker, but it should be. That's where the future is headed

Re: Openpilot – open-source self-driving agent

#94

Post by ma2rten »

jerkstate wrote: post #90
taneq wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh, I'm not saying car companies are perfect and I'm well aware that the way the sausage gets made is nowhere as rigorous as we'd like (just take the Toyota unintended acceleration debacle!) I'm just saying I wouldn't add on top of that something that's essentially a phone app. If nothing else, injecting stuff into your car's critical data bus seems like a bad idea. What if that less-than-carefully-written firmware y…

On the other hand, maybe I lowered the chance of that happening by removing my stock LKAS system. I believe your implicit argument is that the manufacturer and the subcontractors and integrators who made the stock vehicle have a lower defect rate than the OpenPilot engineers, which I’m not sure if there’s any data to support.

A lot more people drive the stock version than the OpenPilot one. All else being equal, it's more likely that OpenPilot has a serious bug than the stock system.

Re: Openpilot – open-source self-driving agent

#95

Post by andyh2 »

notaki wrote: post #78
aphextron wrote: post #47

I've been using Openpilot in my 2018 Corolla for the past few months. Some takeaways: It's mind-blowingly good. Easily on par with Autopilot (That is, Autopilot's ACTUAL capabilities, not what they show in marketing promos). For long highway trips, it's easy to go hours without a disengagement. The full setup costs about $800, is completely plug-and-play, and you can order everything you need on the site (EON/Panda/G…

Openpilot is not on par with Autopilot. There's a long list of things Autopilot can do that Openpilot will never be able to do with existing hardware.

Of that long list, what do you think Tesla owners value the most? ACC+Lane Keeping (what openpilot does) is the answer: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D4y0Fb7XsAEKhFh.jpg

Re: Openpilot – open-source self-driving agent

#96

Post by ma2rten »

lordricky wrote: post #85
taneq wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd love to try it out but I can't bring myself to trust (on any level) something that's essentially a mobile phone running a hacked-together mashup of C and Python. There's no redundancy, no independent components cross-checking each other, nothing as far as I'm aware to try and provide any given level of reliability. (Don't get me wrong, Python is great for research - I wouldn't regard it as highly reliable or good…

With respect to Python and RTOS, this is a copy paste of what I posted few months ago on a similar thread, here on HN: ---- No safety relevant code is written in Python. All the safety relevant code runs real-time on a STM32 micro (inside the Panda), it's written in C and it's placed at the interface between the car and the EON. This code ensures the satisfaction of the 2 main safety principles that a Level 2 driver…

The question in mind is, how do you ensure that the safety code does not have a bug which makes it impossible to disengage the system.

Re: Openpilot – open-source self-driving agent

#97

Post by taneq »

lordricky wrote: post #85
taneq wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd love to try it out but I can't bring myself to trust (on any level) something that's essentially a mobile phone running a hacked-together mashup of C and Python. There's no redundancy, no independent components cross-checking each other, nothing as far as I'm aware to try and provide any given level of reliability. (Don't get me wrong, Python is great for research - I wouldn't regard it as highly reliable or good…

With respect to Python and RTOS, this is a copy paste of what I posted few months ago on a similar thread, here on HN: ---- No safety relevant code is written in Python. All the safety relevant code runs real-time on a STM32 micro (inside the Panda), it's written in C and it's placed at the interface between the car and the EON. This code ensures the satisfaction of the 2 main safety principles that a Level 2 driver…

Claiming that the only "safety-relevant" (much less "safety-critical"!) functions of an auto-steer system are "must be able to easily turn it off" and "must only steer/accelerate/brake slowly" is pretty sketchy in the first place.

Claiming that these functions are adequately implemented by some software running on a single microprocessor? Just nope. No hard-wired shutdown/disconnect system, no redundancy/failover/self-checking, no visible attempts to follow any kind of coding standard... the whole thing's a science project, not a well engineered high-reliability system.

Edit: The reason I'm so adamant about this is that, while I don't consider myself a 'safety expert' or anything of the sort, I'm currently being forced to deal with this stuff (machine safety, not self driving cars) in my day job and it is WAY more indepth, rigorous and tightly regulated than any of the hand-wavey stuff that's being discussed here.

Re: Openpilot – open-source self-driving agent

#98

Post by choppaface »

mgraczyk wrote: post #30

I worked on Openpilot for around a year. Although many of the "cool" parts are not open source, there are still lots of interesting goodies in there worth checking out. For example, there is a semi-standalone CAN processing library: https://github.com/commaai/openpilot/tree/devel/selfdrive/ca... A shitload of hacks and workarounds that make the system work on dozens of cars: https://github.com/commaai/openpilot/tree/…

The value is definitely in the platform-relevant hacks.

Stuff like this makes the reader think the authors have never seen a basic transactional database before: https://github.com/commaai/openpilot/blob/devel/common/param...

Re: Openpilot – open-source self-driving agent

#99

Post by mavhc »

taneq wrote: post #86
jerkstate wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not trying to convince you, but the a-ha moment for me was when I was watching George talk about reverse-engineering the firmware for part of the cruise control in his car, and after decompiling it, he found that there was no functionality for the manufacturer to verify that the firmware had been written properly when flashed by the manufacturer. So just because a big, expensive car company made something, doesn’…

Oh, I'm not saying car companies are perfect and I'm well aware that the way the sausage gets made is nowhere as rigorous as we'd like (just take the Toyota unintended acceleration debacle!) I'm just saying I wouldn't add on top of that something that's essentially a phone app. If nothing else, injecting stuff into your car's critical data bus seems like a bad idea. What if that less-than-carefully-written firmware y…

While it was revealed at the Toyota software was terrible, was it actually shown to be the cause of the acceleration problems? Mostly it was the floor mats and people hitting the wrong pedal.

Re: Openpilot – open-source self-driving agent

#100

Post by sameyolo »

djsumdog wrote: post #7
lukeqsee wrote: post #3

One side of me thinks this is really, really cool. The other side is running away as fast as possible. If anything shouldn't be developed by committee, it's something that controls a few thousand pounds hurtling down the highway at 70MPH with at best an observant human watching over it. Here's my reasoning: Mistakes in Django? Bad things happen. Mistakes in the Linux kernel? Potentially really bad things happen. Mist…

To be fair, all self driving systems need to be fully open, to be inspected by the public. They are way too safety critical to be closed silos controlled by each car company. But I agree, projects like this are also potentially dangerous. How extensive is the testing? Where is the liability? Is that unit running a read-time OS that will not deadlock or have thrashing which could result in a crash? I've written about…

Your car is 13 years old and you could stand to benefit from the safety advantages available in a modern "no auto-cruise or lane assist" vehicle. The safety tech has advanced a lot in that time. This is a quite good way to invest your scrip imo.
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