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Mazda is purging touchscreens from its vehicles

motorauthority.com

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Re: Mazda is purging touchscreens from its vehicles

#821

Post by bahmboo »

JangoSteve wrote: post #632
pwg wrote: post #578

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As a User Experience Professional, I was never able to grasp the true user's need for touch screens in cars. You are viewing the 'need' from the end user perspective. That is likely not the driving force that is causing touch screen proliferation. The likely driving force that is causing it is the manufacturers BOM costs. A single, rectangular, touch screen, that can swallow up a bunch of different knobs and button…

This argument doesn't make a ton of sense to me. It seems like an inconsistent comparison to compare a single touchscreen to many customized knobs/buttons/etc., when you could also compare a single set of knobs/buttons/etc. to different screen sizes across models. Car companies don't tend to custom-design knobs/buttons/etc. for each model. They tend to reuse the same ones across many models to save on development and…

I think that's only half true. There are standardized controls but the dash configurations and wiring harnesses are specific to each model and then even for only a few years. So I'm in agreement with the BOM arguement generally. Also it's a marketing selling point. Consumer wants the shiny new thing.

Re: Mazda is purging touchscreens from its vehicles

#823

Post by twblalock »

kenhwang wrote: post #798
twblalock wrote: post #768

Mazdas still have screens. They have a knob and a few buttons between the seats to control the screen. This change doesn't do much for safety or usability. The knobs are just as distracting as using a touch screen -- you have to look at the screen to see what is being selected, and you have to take a hand off the wheel to use the knob. In many cases it takes several knob movements and button presses to get to somethi…

Arguably, if you can't safely operate a vehicle one-handed for your other hand to use the knob, you definitely shouldn't be using a touchscreen.

My point is that using a knob does not add safety, for exactly the reason you mentioned. It is either safe to drive one-handed at a particular moment, or it is not. Whether a knob or a touchscreen is used makes no difference -- one hand is off the wheel and your eyes are on the screen.

Re: Mazda is purging touchscreens from its vehicles

#824

Post by bumby »

Phillipharryt wrote: post #706
bumby wrote: post #626

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think the "every working button" buys you much here because is could just as easily be stated as "every working touchscreen does the same thing every time I press it". The point from reliability engineering is that everything works until it doesn't. The difficulty with software systems is that they often have complexity that is tough to understand all the paths let alone test/mitigate them (see Boeing 737 Max…

?? Touchscreen interfaces almost always have contextual displays. So no touching it doesn't always do the same thing every time I press it. The space where a spacebar is on your phone is the same space that is sometimes the camera button. I think contextual design does not suit important interfaces.

I meant it in terms of pressing a working contextual display. I think we're saying the same thing. Software introduces many more failure pathways so it's often not suitable for primary hazard mitigation.

Re: Mazda is purging touchscreens from its vehicles

#825

Post by bigiain »

calvinmorrison wrote: post #422
bigiain wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let me guess. Motorcycle rider? (_Fellow_ motorcycle rider...)

Newish bike rider. Do you have a phone mount? Do you listen to music or have any sorta HUD?

I do not use a phone mount. It's that _last_ thing I want when I'm riding.

I _used_ to wear a smart watch (all of the first 3 iterations of the Pebble) because I thought it would be useful to know who's calling when I can feel my phone buzzing in my pocket while riding so I can decide whether to pull over and answer it or not. Turns out the answer is alway "no". Either I'm jus commuting and I can choose to call back (or not) when I get to my destination, or I'm on the road and I don't care that I won't get to it for several hours or more.

I'm pretty good at navigating - so I don't want/miss the gps/mapping thing. On trips I'd _much_ rather just turn down roads I've never been on that look like they're headed kinda the right way, and see where I end up. If I need to, I'll check in on the phone when I fuel up every 2-3 hours - but it's pretty rare for me to end up somewhere with no idea of which direction and at least a rough guess of how far away the place I'm headed to is.

I do sometimes listen to music - using in ear headphones that fit under my helmet. I'll _occasionally_ use that for turn-by-turn navigation to if I'm trying to get somewhere in town I've never been before in a place I'm not familiar enough to dead-reckon myself close enough that I can get to a place where I'll get by on remembered landmarks and street names.

Re: Mazda is purging touchscreens from its vehicles

#827

Post by elihu »

jwr wrote: post #676
TheGRS wrote: post #610

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are knobs and plastic moldings that expensive though? I'm not sure this is really a driving factor. Touch screens have marketing appeal (at least from the seller's perspective), I have to think having a shiny touch screen on your new Mazda is simply just trying to get more people to purchase a new car and nothing more.

> Are knobs and plastic moldings that expensive though? If you consider the entire cost, yes. Every BOM item has a huge cost associated with it, and it's price only a small fraction. Consider that for every item you need to: * secure supply for the next 10 years or so * organize purchasing and put it into the supply chain * design assembly instructions, teach workers how to assemble it * design and implement testing…

> Especially given that you can then deliver crappy software and the market will bear it, because we have been trained to expect and accept crappy software.

I'd put it differently; I'd say we've been trained to expect anything with (user-visible) software to be crappy, and to accept it because we have no alternative.

Re: Mazda is purging touchscreens from its vehicles

#828

Post by mch82 »

ghostbrainalpha wrote: post #587
marapuru wrote: post #47

Praise to Mazda for making this decision. As a User Experience Professional, I was never able to grasp the true user's need for touch screens in cars. For years I have been working on product interfaces (not just apps). Many studies I conducted actually told me that people favored analog controls over digital touch screens controls. It gives you tactile feedback, making it accessible for anyone with sense of touch. >…

This is exactly what got me into modding Mechanical Keyboards. There is no reason that I NEED to launch Spotify from an actual switch controller... https://www.alliedelec.com/product/electroswitch-inc-/6600/7... But it feels so much better to control inputs with hardware. And rotary dials for volume, and many tasks in photoshop are infinitely superior.

Also fun to use an Arduino Leonardo to create custom input devices that are understood to be USB keyboards/mice!

Re: Mazda is purging touchscreens from its vehicles

#829

Post by xedeon »

epistasis wrote: post #673
xedeon wrote: post #497

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I do agree, though, that touchscreens beyond phone interfaces should be used very sparingly. The Tesla's all-touchscreen situation in particular seems like a terrible idea. Most of us are used to being able to adjust the AC without looking, and that's only possible because there are physical controls we can feel. This is a very common misconception. You CAN adjust the A/C via the steering wheel buttons, turn it off…

> You CAN adjust the A/C via the steering wheel buttons, turn it off, control the fan speed etc. It's very intuitive. I'm doing web searches for this right now and not finding anything, either for Model 3 or Model S, or just Tesla in general. Where do they hide this information?

The user manual would be a start. It's built-in on the interface and you can even search for keywords.

Re: Mazda is purging touchscreens from its vehicles

#830

Post by [deleted] »

owl57 wrote: post #735
leonroy wrote: post #689

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The likely driving force that is causing it is the manufacturers BOM costs. Whilst I think this is part of it's about more than just reducing the BOM. There's a trend to move all interfaces from knobs and switches to touch screens even when money isn't the problem. For example the SpaceX Dragon capsule also takes this approach which you can see from the images below: https://www.spacex.com/crew-dragon A heavily vib…

Buyer's only get a chance to regret it after they've spent a lot of time with the vehicle. Several years ago, probably. Now, when their previous car already has a similar touchscreen?

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