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Automakers are starting to admit that drivers hate touchscreens

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Re: Automakers are starting to admit that drivers hate touchscreens

#501

Post by dotancohen »

adrr wrote: post #264
andrewmcwatters wrote: post #189

I wouldn't mind touchscreens as long as these imbecile developers would strictly limit UI response time to under 16ms. In no world where you're barrelling 3,000+ lbs of mass at tens of miles an hour should you be distracted by some moronic app or subsystem failing to respond in time because it was written by under-experienced software "engineers." Any software running as a part of a motor vehicle should be federally…

I don’t know that would be helpful. I hate digging through my Tesla’s menus to control the wipers even though it is very responsive.

In a Tesla, you can press the physical button on the left stalk to operate the wipers. Pressing that button performs two actions at once:

1. The wipers perform a full sweep, clearing the windscreen.

And

2. The wipers' configuration appears on the screen, ready to be set to any configuration with a single tap.

I did not like it at first, but after some practice it really works well. I still hate the AC controls, though, and must enable lane keeping before even trying to adjust the climate.

Re: Automakers are starting to admit that drivers hate touchscreens

#503

Post by DeathArrow »

kmarc wrote: post #500

A bit off topic but I enjoyed reading the conversation here from people with different perception / opinion about touch vs button. I'm more on the button side of the argument, but that's not the point. I rather wonder how many years from now would I think back of these arguments as some "could have happened in the past but now it's absolutely irrelevant", as autonomous cars* would take over, and human-driven ones wou…

> I rather wonder how many years from now would I think back of these arguments as some "could have happened in the past but now it's absolutely irrelevant", as autonomous cars* would take over, and human-driven ones would be lawfully banned on 99% of the roads, as horse carriages are banned today compared to 100 years ago.

I wonder if software will first check the subscription and social credit before starting the car. If you are in a remote area without mobile network coverage, then tough luck.

Re: Automakers are starting to admit that drivers hate touchscreens

#504

Post by Lio »

emodendroket wrote: post #446
vocram wrote: post #403

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I refuse to do work that will kill people Isn’t a crappy UI on a car something that could kill people?

In some abstract sense, like how you could say that you should absolutely not drive a car as you could accidentally kill a pedestrian.

I don't think it's all that abstract.

We know that phone using drivers perform worse than drink drivers. They regularly kill people because they're not concentrating on what's in front of them.

If you change the car's UI from something with low latency[1] to something with much greater latency[2] then you are definitely putting others at higher risk because drivers spend longer not concentrating on driving.

--

1. See button, move hand, feel large physical button, look back at road, press button, feel feedback click.

2. See screen, move hand, see screen pops up menu on hand proximity, see menu item, click menu item, miss-press try again, wait for animation, attempt to select feature but hand moves due to bump in the road, move hand again, try to select feature again, miss-press try again, wait for feedback animation, look back at road.

Re: Automakers are starting to admit that drivers hate touchscreens

#505

Post by ryan-allen »

checkyoursudo wrote: post #393

With. A. Passion. Other touch screens (or similar things) I dislike: - the controls on my stove top - the controls on my monitor - the controls on my tv - the controls on my thermostat - probably more All of these should have physical buttons for the limited number of functions required. Or, at a minimum, for navigation and confirmation. Touch screens there suck. My wife's car has a touch screen on the control/infota…

My fridge has touch buttons, and they often go haywire and reprogram the desired temperature! They at least beep while the ghost is interacting with them, so I can go and make sure my drinks don't end up frozen.

Re: Automakers are starting to admit that drivers hate touchscreens

#506

Post by fuzzy2 »

I like touchscreens. They’re great for some types of operation, like selecting a destination from the map (not by entering an address). Or for entering text using an on-screen keyboard (when a physical keyboard is not available). So yes, cars should have touchscreens!

However, this is all stuff you wouldn’t do while driving. So while driving, you need something else: physical controls. I believe BMW’s iDrive knob is the best solution. It’s so good, other manufacturers copied it. So yes, cars should also have physical buttons!

Also, physical buttons must not be touch surfaces. They must be actual mechanical physical buttons. My EV has capacitive buttons on the steering wheel. They’re horrible.

Re: Automakers are starting to admit that drivers hate touchscreens

#507

Post by gjadi »

berkle4455 wrote: post #241
sircastor wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> because it was written by under-experienced software "engineers." I used to be an infotainment software engineer for an Auto maker. There’s this idea in the software industry that because the software behaves poorly on your car’s system, it must’ve been written poorly by someone who didn’t know what they were doing. In my experience it was almost always a matter of the hardware being stretched way past its limits.…

Dude Winamp was a clean, simple and wickedly responsive UI that allowed a multitude of real-time audio tweaks and supported playlists with thousands of files. This was in the late 90’s running on 166Mhz processors with maybe 16MB of system ram. Are you saying modern car infotainment systems have fewer resources allocated to the UI?

I haven't yet worked on automotive stuff but I work in the embedded space.

We're using small MCU (not CPU) to drive 480x272 or 800x600 screen. 240Mhz, 8MB of RAM. For example on ESP32-S2 or ESP32-S3.

If you had GPS, bluetooth, wifi, etc. to the mix, yeah that's a challenge and you need to make your UI pretty simple.

Re: Automakers are starting to admit that drivers hate touchscreens

#509

Post by kmarc »

DeathArrow wrote: post #503
kmarc wrote: post #500

A bit off topic but I enjoyed reading the conversation here from people with different perception / opinion about touch vs button. I'm more on the button side of the argument, but that's not the point. I rather wonder how many years from now would I think back of these arguments as some "could have happened in the past but now it's absolutely irrelevant", as autonomous cars* would take over, and human-driven ones wou…

> I rather wonder how many years from now would I think back of these arguments as some "could have happened in the past but now it's absolutely irrelevant", as autonomous cars* would take over, and human-driven ones would be lawfully banned on 99% of the roads, as horse carriages are banned today compared to 100 years ago. I wonder if software will first check the subscription and social credit before starting the c…

Oh, good one!

When I say autonomous, I truly mean autonomous, in the sense that for the basic functionality (go around, authenticate, communicate with the rest of the cars) the system would not need to be centralized at all. No Internet connection needed.

Re: Automakers are starting to admit that drivers hate touchscreens

#510

Post by KingOfCoders »

Driving a BMW X3 recently and a Tesla Model Y, I want a compromise. The Tesla had to few buttons (but I'd keep the display, though HUD is nicer) and the BMW had to many buttons and the display felt 1990.

(Also it was so much easier to find settings in the Tesla)

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