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Farmers look for ways to circumvent tractor software locks

npr.org

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Re: Farmers look for ways to circumvent tractor software locks

#161

Post by michaelmrose »

beachy wrote: post #51
jacquesm wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why is it that these farmers believe they have a right to modify that software? Because a farmer in the middle of a harvest can't afford to 'wait in line' until the manufacturer or the dealership has time to send someone over to make a repair. I've lived in a farming area and had a pretty good machine shop as well as a ton of welding gear and it didn't take long before farmers knew where to find me in case of a pro…

Rather than adding laws, another good market-driven outcome would removing any laws that inhibit a healthy industry in providing plug-in replacement kits for the brains of the tractor. Yes, official warranties would be voided, so new providers of warranty services would spring up.

Every aspect of this is hypothetical and most likely imaginary. Can you provide example's of similar situations that have played out like this?

Re: Farmers look for ways to circumvent tractor software locks

#162

Post by qq66 »

lobotryas wrote: post #129
rando832 wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If a team of hundred of engineers struggle with their codebase internally, Joe Farmer isn't going to have a fucking clue how to repair their software correctly. > But trust me on this, locking this down is a very good idea. Joe Farmer may not know, but Joe farmer has "the internet", and ability to pay an independent software engineer. And people would absolutely find and fix bugs that john deer is missing. Honestly…

What happens if this independent fix results in a death? Do you really think JD will escape liability?

Of course they will. If a hit man cuts your brake lines, Ford will not be liable.

Re: Farmers look for ways to circumvent tractor software locks

#163

Post by Nilzor »

tbyehl wrote: post #47

I'm starting to wonder if these articles are driven by a PR firm paid by John Deere's competition. They're always about John Deere and only John Deere. Aside from the Motherboard / Vice article, they never provide any specifics about the maintenance or repair operations that farms are prevented from doing on their own. With the Vice article, 2 of the 3 things they mention are modifying the tractors to operate in ways…

I'd like to see some concrete examples as well. What kind of repairs are you unable to do?

Re: Farmers look for ways to circumvent tractor software locks

#164

Post by Nilzor »

tbyehl wrote: post #47

I'm starting to wonder if these articles are driven by a PR firm paid by John Deere's competition. They're always about John Deere and only John Deere. Aside from the Motherboard / Vice article, they never provide any specifics about the maintenance or repair operations that farms are prevented from doing on their own. With the Vice article, 2 of the 3 things they mention are modifying the tractors to operate in ways…

I'd like to see some concrete examples as well. What kind of repairs are you unable to do?

Re: Farmers look for ways to circumvent tractor software locks

#165

Post by Nilzor »

tbyehl wrote: post #47

I'm starting to wonder if these articles are driven by a PR firm paid by John Deere's competition. They're always about John Deere and only John Deere. Aside from the Motherboard / Vice article, they never provide any specifics about the maintenance or repair operations that farms are prevented from doing on their own. With the Vice article, 2 of the 3 things they mention are modifying the tractors to operate in ways…

I'd like to see some concrete examples as well. What kind of repairs are you unable to do?

Re: Farmers look for ways to circumvent tractor software locks

#166

Post by stordoff »

soheil wrote: post #121

Imagine not so long in the future if self-driving cars were forced to reveal their code because of the right-to-repair bill, 1. who without a vast depth of knowledge in C++, etc. would be able to go anywhere near it? 2. even if they did is it in their best interest or anyone else's if they tinker with the code and made the car take undesirable actions? Maybe buying a tractor should be replaced with leasing tractors,…

There's already plenty of hardware components A) that non-domain experts would have no idea how to repair and B) with would it be potentially hazardous to meddle (e.g. a botched brake repair). I'm not really sure how software presents a substantially different risk.

There's also a reasonable middle ground: vehicles will run unsigned code, but running software not signed by the manufacturer transfers all liability to the vehicle owner in case of bugs and/or malfunction. Third-party maintainers can provide signed builds and contractually agree to cover the same (allowing repair/maintenance even if the original manufacturer stops providing it).

Re: Farmers look for ways to circumvent tractor software locks

#167

Post by Nilzor »

throwaway_jddev wrote: post #124
grigjd3 wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many lines of code does it take to register as the largest you've dealt with? The largest I dealt with took 45 minutes to grab the repo. I don't state that as a point of honor, more like a point in needless over-effort.

I would say the JD's tractor software (if taken in it's entirety) is on par with the modern Linux kernel in size, if not larger. Worse yet, the codebase is spread along many different repositories, teams, and build systems. I've seen integration builds take days to finish (not including running of unit tests). Look I get it, John Deere is evil. But this codebase is beyond any one person or team's comprehension. It's…

Did you see this comment?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14076318

I don't think the customers need or want to modify the software. Just open it up for hardware replacements

Re: Farmers look for ways to circumvent tractor software locks

#168

Post by zanny »

Cyph0n wrote: post #52
TaylorAlexander wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hear this constantly but it doesn't ring true to me. Look at the 3D printer inventors from the 1980's who rested on their laurels selling $30,000 3D printers until their patents expired and the open source community started producing them for under $1000. Ten years after the patents expired, you can get a 3D printer for $199 that genuinely rivals the quality of a $30,000 printer just 10 years ago. There are all man…

But would the innovation that led to the creation of 3D printers have taken place if patent law didn't exist? And since the open source movement is based entirely on those patents (as I understand), would cheap 3D printers exist if the 1980s tech was never developed? I think these are the questions you should be thinking about when arguing against IP protection laws. Edit : One thing you failed to mention is that the…

There are two research incentives. The incentive of potential profit, and the incentive of wanting an end product.

People would have wanted, and invested in, the development of 3D printers for just the personal desire part. This is how the most valuable R&D works right now - the vast majority of cancer and major life debilitating disease research is being done not by big pharma (who are instead just researching more dick enlargement pills and modified recipes of the same drugs on the market today they can re-patent for 20 years and bribe off doctors to prescribe exclusively by name because they are the most reliable payoffs for their investments) but by university and state level research institution and non-profits dedicated to their research.

The unsettling truth is that truly revolutionary research does not often come out of profit driven R&D labs. Those organizations are arranged to minimize the risk of research, which also dramatically cuts its potential yields by only targeting predictable results that can quickly be turned into government-granted monopoly profits. Its exploitation of a flawed system that takes talent that could be going towards truly innovative R&D that would almost certainly offset at least what would be lost in cutting these (predominantly) leeches out of the industry.

Re: Farmers look for ways to circumvent tractor software locks

#169

Post by guelo »

throwaway_jddev wrote: post #124
grigjd3 wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many lines of code does it take to register as the largest you've dealt with? The largest I dealt with took 45 minutes to grab the repo. I don't state that as a point of honor, more like a point in needless over-effort.

I would say the JD's tractor software (if taken in it's entirety) is on par with the modern Linux kernel in size, if not larger. Worse yet, the codebase is spread along many different repositories, teams, and build systems. I've seen integration builds take days to finish (not including running of unit tests). Look I get it, John Deere is evil. But this codebase is beyond any one person or team's comprehension. It's…

You said there were 150-300 engineers working on this code. That is at least an order of magnitude less than the number of people developing Linux.

Re: Farmers look for ways to circumvent tractor software locks

#170

Post by rando832 »

rando832 wrote: post #111
throwaway_jddev wrote: post #92

Hey all, I worked on software for John Deere. This is a throwaway account for obvious reasons. Opinions expressed here are MY OWN. I no longer work for John Deere or am associated with them in any way. I was part of one of the many teams that work on this software. Specifically I was part of John Deere's ISG division also known as the Intelligent Solutions Group. The ISG division (was at the time) responsible for tyi…

> If a team of hundred of engineers struggle with their codebase internally, Joe Farmer isn't going to have a fucking clue how to repair their software correctly. > But trust me on this, locking this down is a very good idea. Joe Farmer may not know, but Joe farmer has "the internet", and ability to pay an independent software engineer. And people would absolutely find and fix bugs that john deer is missing. Honestly…

Also, if it's built on open source as he says, that likely means linux, and tons of code that John Deer is not reviewing, so... trust you that john deer needs to protect farmers from letting people fix the code THEY WROTE. lol.
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