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Car companies are in a billion-dollar software war

insideevs.com

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Re: Car companies are in a billion-dollar software war

#11

Post by School-Cotton »

AlotOfReading wrote: post #7
tehjoker wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure this is exactly the problem. It sounds like turning the car into a platform with changeable parts has caused both organizational and technical problems. To be fair, im still not sold that this is an advancement except maybe in simplifying the number of components. I'd prefer the car to work without "updates" and DLC. Why does my car need a firewall??

It's not practical to produce a car that never needs updates. That would be a bug-free system, which is impossible. Since they're going to ship updates anyway, a lot of focus is on minimizing the cost and hence OTA. For what it's worth, I work in this industry and the general rule of thumb is that every increase in validation from QM (standard quality) up to the various levels of safety critical code has up to 10x th…

> It's not practical to produce a car that never needs updates

Exactly that was done for decades.

Re: Car companies are in a billion-dollar software war

#13

Post by cosmicgadget »

x0x0 wrote: post #8
cosmicgadget wrote: post #4

> These legacy companies have poached big hitters from Apple, Tesla and Google. They’ve sunk billions into it. Part of the problem might be poaching high title people from embedded tech companies while not doing anything for developer compensation.

it's a lot cheaper to pay one exec a couple million than to staff a medium-sized software engineering org: even 500 people at an average fully burdened cost of $250k is $125m/y.

Yeah I get this is their calculus and am suggesting it's exactly why they are failing.

Re: Car companies are in a billion-dollar software war

#14

Post by PeterStuer »

Jiocus wrote: post #10

The author mentions "military grade firewall", as a must have in a vehicle. Genuine question; What's a military grade firewall?

I guess it's the same as a 'bulletproof firewall'. Just a colloquial saying indicating both high importance and required quality expected for operation in strong adverserial environments.

Re: Car companies are in a billion-dollar software war

#15

Post by tonetegeatinst »

FrankWilhoit wrote: post #2

Embedded-systems programming is not taught, and no one is willing to pay for training. The result is that development is outsourced to entities that claim, falsely, to have the knowledge. Eventually the consequences of the fact that they do not have the knowledge surface in an undeniable manner, and the only way to cover is to make a great show of a fresh start. (This affects all industries, not just automotive, but…

This is all the more frustrating as I'm in the security side if IT, and have been trying to teach myself C and assembly for embedded development and understanding how malware and vulnerability exist in this ecosystem and how I can help address these issues.

Re: Car companies are in a billion-dollar software war

#17

Post by peanut-walrus »

Jiocus wrote: post #10

The author mentions "military grade firewall", as a must have in a vehicle. Genuine question; What's a military grade firewall?

As someone who has been working in security for past 10 years and systems / network admin for another 10 before that, I don't even know what a firewall is supposed to be any more.

Also, since I've worked on military systems a lot, I suppose a military grade firewall is just iptables for which someone has written a shitty gui (that might as well just be a webshell) and packaged it into a green rugged box.

Re: Car companies are in a billion-dollar software war

#18

Post by [deleted] »

School-Cotton wrote: post #11
AlotOfReading wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not practical to produce a car that never needs updates. That would be a bug-free system, which is impossible. Since they're going to ship updates anyway, a lot of focus is on minimizing the cost and hence OTA. For what it's worth, I work in this industry and the general rule of thumb is that every increase in validation from QM (standard quality) up to the various levels of safety critical code has up to 10x th…

> It's not practical to produce a car that never needs updates Exactly that was done for decades.

[deleted]

Re: Car companies are in a billion-dollar software war

#19

Post by rjsw »

AlotOfReading wrote: post #7
tehjoker wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure this is exactly the problem. It sounds like turning the car into a platform with changeable parts has caused both organizational and technical problems. To be fair, im still not sold that this is an advancement except maybe in simplifying the number of components. I'd prefer the car to work without "updates" and DLC. Why does my car need a firewall??

It's not practical to produce a car that never needs updates. That would be a bug-free system, which is impossible. Since they're going to ship updates anyway, a lot of focus is on minimizing the cost and hence OTA. For what it's worth, I work in this industry and the general rule of thumb is that every increase in validation from QM (standard quality) up to the various levels of safety critical code has up to 10x th…

Updating the software in the computers that control the car has traditionally been combined with providing diagnostic support for it through the dealerships, not done OTA. Having an OBDII connector has been mandated in vehicles for a long time, you plug something into it that lets you either listen to CAN bus traffic or reprogram an individual Electronic Control Unit (ECU).

Now that all vehicles have entertainment systems connected to the internet, I guess it is tempting to use that to reprogram ECUs, I haven't been working in this area recently though.

The first use case of connecting entertainment systems to a vehicle bus that I can remember was to read some engine settings and turn up the volume on the radio at higher speeds.

Re: Car companies are in a billion-dollar software war

#20

Post by AlotOfReading »

x0x0 wrote: post #8
cosmicgadget wrote: post #4

> These legacy companies have poached big hitters from Apple, Tesla and Google. They’ve sunk billions into it. Part of the problem might be poaching high title people from embedded tech companies while not doing anything for developer compensation.

it's a lot cheaper to pay one exec a couple million than to staff a medium-sized software engineering org: even 500 people at an average fully burdened cost of $250k is $125m/y.

One major issue has been that paying a developer market rates is practically unthinkable to traditional automakers. If you were to apply to a mid/senior job in Michigan, you might get offered $125k. The typical workaround has been to establish "software offices" on the west coast with separate pay scales and separate corporate structures that largely function as internal "external" vendors. The C suite are able to pretend they're not overpaying, and the teams getting work done are able to attract people closer to market rate.
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