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Please make a dumb car

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Re: Please make a dumb car

#71

Post by noduerme »

tsujp wrote: post #41

One thing I was flabbergasted at recently was Tesla offering, and the government allowing, regular drivers to use a yoke steering wheel like F1 drivers. Not only is it harder for the average person to handle but their firmware hadn't accounted for the fact that if you steer fully left or right the yoke is upside down and if you try and indicate it ends up indicating on the wrong side. What is wrong with a wheel and f…

I think these gimmicks and the new touchscreen UI serve a purpose for Tesla. Their goal is to make the car so divorced from human input that (1) it becomes increasingly reasonable to claim that an unfinished self-driving system is no more dangerous than a human in the loop, and (2) their fan base is conditioned to accept the eventuality of having no meaningful input (or feedback) at all. As for part two, I noticed it a couple years ago with a relative who bought a Tesla and was still just awed by its features. But all the ones he was awed by were the ones that took power away from the driver. I wondered then, why would anyone want to own this car once it really does all the driving for you? No one will actually own a Tesla at that point, they'll just call one on an app. Except for maybe a few silly people who want to feel like they're telling it what to do with a joystick.

Re: Please make a dumb car

#72

Post by noduerme »

Isinlor wrote: post #55
quartesixte wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Elon is weirdly good at getting regulators to just let him do things. FSD beta. The yoke steering wheel. Like a quarter of everything SpaceX does. Does he just have really good lobbyists? Is his force of personality just that good? It’s kind of fascinating.

He does not have good lobbyists. Have you seen Tesla being the only company not invited on electric car day in white house? https://www.autoweek.com/news/green-cars/a37244461/elon-musk... Do you know that Tesla will be excluded from tax credits for EVs? https://www.cnbc.com/2021/10/29/energy-secretary-defends-tes... Do you know that Texas where Tesla is building its next factory does not allow to sell Teslas? https:/…

Eh, he just needs to touch up his PR when it comes to labor relations.

> Do you know that Texas where Tesla is building its next factory does not allow to sell Teslas?

You think you can't buy a Tesla in Texas? What planet are you on?

Re: Please make a dumb car

#73

Post by mylonov »

anitil wrote: post #70
EdwardDiego wrote: post #24

I would kill for Ye Olde Manually Wound windows. Electric windows struggle in temperature extremes, and seem to break down far more often than my old hand-cranked windows ever did. Also, I had more precise control with the hand-crank.

I have an entirely unreasonable fear of getting stuck in my car as it slowly sinks, unable to open the windows. It makes me want to get hand-cranked windows.

According to Mythbusters [1] it's almost impossible to wind down the windows in a sinking car after it reaches a certain depth. Much better is to have a window breaker tool. You can have one which doubles as a seat belt slicer too. [1] https://mythresults.com/episode72

Re: Please make a dumb car

#74

Post by khazhoux »

Our Volvo doesn't let you adjust the volume when you're in reverse. That means if you're backing out of the garage and the music is blaring -- you can't turn it off!

The Volvo UI pops up an almost full-display warning when it can't connect to the phone over bluetooth on startup. This UI takes priority over the rear camera. So I guess it's better to hit Timmy and his puppy when I'm backing out, so long as I know my phone's not connected!

The Volvo's headlights have "smart" auto-adjustments. That means I can't leave the high beams on, or force it to stay on low beams. It will decide for me! I think maybe I can disable this... somehow.

So smart.

Re: Please make a dumb car

#75

Post by jacknews »

Haha, the 'smart' cat is well and truly out of the bag now, and the sad thing is we kind of did it to ourselves by demanding, or at least, buying, these features.

'Smart' means manufacturers can put ads on everything, sell your usage data, and of course all the smarts become obsolete or break easily after just a couple of years, often turning otherwise perfectly good hardware into a doorstop.

As part of 'right to repair' we should also demand 'right to own UI'; appliances have some standard (electronic/data) interfaces, and you can add off-the-shelf, or even custom UI of your choice.

Re: Please make a dumb car

#76

Post by linux-user »

porknubbins wrote: post #23

Power seats are not a pointless luxury. I’m pretty sure they are continuously adjustable which is much better than trying to pull on some lever and get the seat to pop into approximately the right place. To say nothing of mulitple drivers with memorized positions etc.

Are all your chairs at home and office also powered?

Re: Please make a dumb car

#77

Post by nicbou »

I have an old Renault Kangoo. It's a box on wheels. Big enough to fit a bicycle or a bed, small enough to drive like a car. I'm going on a road trip today.

This car is a breeze to work on. It's a bog standard car. If something breaks, it can be fixed. The only things that can break are the things that make the car run. You don't need a specially trained technician. You don't need to remove a layer of plastic to get to the engine. There is no touch screen.

Re: Please make a dumb car

#78

Post by tomlong »

throwawaysea wrote: post #22
zanzibar735 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed. I recommend Roku TVs - at least the UX is simple and it doesn't spy on you or show you ads.

Doesn’t the Roku software spy on you and don’t they track what you are watching?

My pi hole's top blocked domain by some margin is is scribe.logs.roku.com, who knows what else it might be blocking or missing in addition to this.

Re: Please make a dumb car

#80

Post by function_seven »

viburnum wrote: post #68
tsujp wrote: post #41

One thing I was flabbergasted at recently was Tesla offering, and the government allowing, regular drivers to use a yoke steering wheel like F1 drivers. Not only is it harder for the average person to handle but their firmware hadn't accounted for the fact that if you steer fully left or right the yoke is upside down and if you try and indicate it ends up indicating on the wrong side. What is wrong with a wheel and f…

The steering wheel in an F1 car only goes about 220 degrees in either direction (drivers have to keep their hands on the wheel and their arms aren't made of rubber). The steering in a regular car goes about 540 degrees in either direction (one and a half times around). When parallel parking you often have to turn the wheel three whole revolutions. F1 steering https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RVz6IW_wegs&t=45s Tesla st…

Your second video horrified me. What the hell are they thinking with the touch-sensitive inputs on the steering wheel? Nevermind the weird shape and the issues with orientation when signaling during a steering maneuver. Those aren't actual buttons, they're no better than a touch screen.

When I drive, my hands aren't always in the exact same position on the wheel. Muscle-memory won't reliably have my thumb landing on the correct signal direction. If I have to honk the horn, I need to be able to do that instantly, without thinking. Some cutesy icon located away from the edge of the steering wheel will guarantee that the horn sounds simultaneously with the "crunch" of another car backing into me.

My proposed rule-of-thumb: If a video game company wouldn't design their controllers this way, you shouldn't do it either for the most common—or most urgent—functions. Turn signals, wipers, horn, and hazard lights should all be real buttons that are in a consistent location. Horn should be in the hub of the steering wheel.

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