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The subtle art of designing physical controls for cars

theturnsignalblog.com

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Re: The subtle art of designing physical controls for cars

#71

Post by robocat »

scottbez1 wrote: post #14
bigstrat2003 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The smart knob you made is genuinely one of the best hardware creations I have ever seen. I only wish that I was creative enough to think up good uses for it so that I could put it to work, lol.

Haha, I've built at least 5 of them and my problem is that I enjoy the hardware/design portion as a hobby, but writing the software to put them to use feels too much like my day job, so I haven't actually done anything too useful yet...

Have you worked in electronics design?

Your knowledge seems practical and fairly deep to me. I loved electronics so I got an electronics degree and I ended up with an irrational antipathy towards electronics since then. Got a software job instead which turned out to be a great career (compared with most of the electronics guys I know).

Re: The subtle art of designing physical controls for cars

#72

Post by hcarvalhoalves »

Sorry, but if you're suggesting any AC control different than simple knobs [1], you're failing miserably.

This [1] type of control doesn't require taking eyes out the road to adjust temp, fan speed and fan direction. Since it's a simple fscking knob, it can be adjusted by feel alone, and both the clicks and the angle give feedback on what setting it is.

The suggested solution is bad, for these reasons:

It tries to be clever by providing the lost "clickness" with haptic feedback, but it still misses the most important feedback, which is the angle of the knob. So it still requires you take eyes out of the road to see the setting you're in.

It also commits one of the cardinal sins of good UI, which is being a modal control. So, again, you need to take eyes out of the road and keep clicking to put in the right setting.

[1] https://i0.wp.com/weberbrothersauto.s3.amazonaws.com/2022/12...

Re: The subtle art of designing physical controls for cars

#73

Post by insane_dreamer »

kdmtctl wrote: post #69
insane_dreamer wrote: post #55

My favorite car control system is the BMW iDrive rotary dial. Touch screens are fine for given much more fine-grained access to controls. But they should be limited to controls that you _don't need to set while driving_. It's absurd that it takes 3 taps on a screen -- diverting my attention to the screen -- on my Tesla to turn on defogging (a common event here!) while I can do it with a one touch (now muscle-memorize…

Did you ever tried to use the rotary dial for text input? I gave up immediately. The car has a regular screen regular, no touch. Something is good only when balanced.

Yeah, agreed on a rotary dial being terrible for text input. That's where a touch screen shines. But you shouldn't need to do anything requiring text input while driving.

Re: The subtle art of designing physical controls for cars

#75

Post by NegativeLatency »

DigitalSea wrote: post #68

I learned this lesson the hard way with my early 2000s BMW 5 Series (a 2004 model). It had a single joystick-style knob (iDrive, if I remember correctly) controlling a screen that handled everything—climate, settings, and more. The problem? It was an all-in-one system, completely integrated with vehicle functions, which meant you couldn’t swap it out for a newer or better OEM system. You were stuck with aging tech, a…

Having a standard DIN/double DIN slot for a head unit also makes upgrades/changes easier. With all the new cars having such bespoke and integrated systems, it makes stuff like changing out the head unit much harder.

ex putting a new carplay double DIN head unit is much easier in older cars, and difficult/impossible in newer cars

Re: The subtle art of designing physical controls for cars

#76

Post by NegativeLatency »

tiffanyh wrote: post #44

I'm always reminded of the QuickTime v4.0 volume rocker and how painful it was to use. Screenshot: https://www.macintoshrepository.org/_resize.php?imgenc=ZmlsZ... Fortunately, it was changed to just a slider in v5.0 as seen here: https://jablickar.cz/en/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/Apple-Qui...

I don't remember using that one, is it a wheel you can interact with, or does clicking the volume chunks change the volume?

Re: The subtle art of designing physical controls for cars

#77

Post by timc3 »

DigitalSea wrote: post #68

I learned this lesson the hard way with my early 2000s BMW 5 Series (a 2004 model). It had a single joystick-style knob (iDrive, if I remember correctly) controlling a screen that handled everything—climate, settings, and more. The problem? It was an all-in-one system, completely integrated with vehicle functions, which meant you couldn’t swap it out for a newer or better OEM system. You were stuck with aging tech, a…

My 2021 BMW has iDrive and physical buttons and dials. It’s a fantastic system.

A lot of iDrive systems can be replaced, though I do worry where the cheap ebay components come from.

Later iDrive was so much better than earlier, probably the best system I have used in a car, but now they have gone with huge touch screens. yes it looks impressive and no I don't want it.

Re: The subtle art of designing physical controls for cars

#78

Post by ggreer »

insane_dreamer wrote: post #55

My favorite car control system is the BMW iDrive rotary dial. Touch screens are fine for given much more fine-grained access to controls. But they should be limited to controls that you _don't need to set while driving_. It's absurd that it takes 3 taps on a screen -- diverting my attention to the screen -- on my Tesla to turn on defogging (a common event here!) while I can do it with a one touch (now muscle-memorize…

That's odd. I live in the Pacific Northwest and I can count on one hand the number of times I've had to manually turn on defogging. Often my Model 3 will say, "auto defogging". Maybe your humidity sensor is faulty?

I agree that physical controls for these things would be ideal, but nowadays the only one that annoys me is lack of the wiper controls. I think even that issue would go away if Tesla used rain sensors instead of cameras to trigger the wipers.

Re: The subtle art of designing physical controls for cars

#79

Post by vt240 »

NegativeLatency wrote: post #76
tiffanyh wrote: post #44

I'm always reminded of the QuickTime v4.0 volume rocker and how painful it was to use. Screenshot: https://www.macintoshrepository.org/_resize.php?imgenc=ZmlsZ... Fortunately, it was changed to just a slider in v5.0 as seen here: https://jablickar.cz/en/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/Apple-Qui...

I don't remember using that one, is it a wheel you can interact with, or does clicking the volume chunks change the volume?

There's no wheel on a one button mouse :P Sorry I am really joking here. We have a number of Avid mixing consoles from the 2010s that have extensive mouse UI wheel controls, yet they shipped with trackball controllers. They're actually much easier to use with a standard three-button scroll-wheel mouse. Haha.

Re: The subtle art of designing physical controls for cars

#80

Post by s0rce »

Retric wrote: post #67
s0rce wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find the thermostat mode only works on overcast days or at night as the sun contributes so much feeling of warmth when driving (in California) that the heating and cooling thermostat doesn't work well.

A sun load sensor mostly solves this, they used to be a high end feature but it's becoming more common.

Oh, neat, never knew about that!
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