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I don't think it escaped everybody's attention.. there are several companies/people working on this.
Citation needed.
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I'm confused, how does getting the speed directly from the car improve directions and heads-up display of speed over getting the speed from the GPS unit?
Speed readings obtained from a GPS unit is never going to be as accurate as the reading derived directly from the car, because GPS locations are only accurate to about 10ft (IINM). Your car speed can be used in tandem with the relatively inaccurate location given by a GPS unit to give a better location reading. More info here: http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Robotics/Navigation/Localizatio...
Of course, having poor signal in urban canyons or tunnels is the sort of thing I didn't think of, and that's where getting data from the car would really be handy.
I strongly doubt their "works on any car since 1995" claim. While OBD-II has been an official standard for very long, not all cars support it equally well at all. We've had serious trouble getting it to work with A-brand cars made in e.g. 1999.
Therefore, I believe that them making this claim can mean one of two things:
- They're lying
- Their "prototype" has seen little field testing at this point.
Additionally, however, "Virtual Mechanic" based on OBD-II alone is going to be a half-assed feature (to my understanding). OBD-II contains little more error reporting than that related to emission (i.e. your engine). If your airbag or your breaks malfunction, then this may only be reported through manufacturer-specific protocols. Most importantly, this would mean that a light in your dashboard may be lit, while the Moj.io app says "Running Great!" I highly doubt that they have implemented all manufacturer-specific protocols to a sufficient extent for this feature to work well. It is technically possible, but it needs either a lot of reverse engineering, or a lot of purchased IP.
I really like the other features (FamilyConnect, etc), though, and how they're presented. Well done!
Still, while I like this approach, and while I want this badly myself (and a lot of moj.io seems better planned, marketed and designed than what I've been involved in), based on the above I have strong doubts.
Now, I understand that this may be hard criticism, and maybe I'm completely wrong about some aspects - I'm no real expert here. So if one of the founders reads this, feel free to correct me!
I wonder what the power draw is? a tad worried my car wont start after longterm parking.
mojio monitors your vehicle battery level and ignition state. It will go into a deep sleep state with only critical functions on (e.g. theft monitoring) if the vehicle is not doing much. If the car battery hits some critical level, it will send you an alert and shut itself off.
I've recently done some work for a startup that is developing a highly comparable product. I strongly doubt their "works on any car since 1995" claim. While OBD-II has been an official standard for very long, not all cars support it equally well at all. We've had serious trouble getting it to work with A-brand cars made in e.g. 1999. Therefore, I believe that them making this claim can mean one of two things: - They'…
In regards to the Virtual Mechanic app, you're absolutely right. We know that presently it won't be as extensive on european cars as it will be for North America, which is part of the reason for focusing on the North American market for now. But that is just one app, and probably the least interesting one to the general market of drivers out there. We think the majority of the other apps that we and the dev community will build will only need basic info like odo reading, speed, on/off ignition states and what gear the car is in. So much can be done with that when blended with data from the device's accelerometer, GPS, etc. Jay
Thanks for the very informed thinking on this! Great dialog.
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ODB means On Board Diagnostics. A majority of vehicles only report information - its not generally a control interface.
That doesn't mean that the security issue doesn't exist. Via wikipedia: "Researchers at the University of Washington and University of California examined the security around OBD, and found that they were able to gain control over many vehicle components via the interface. Furthermore, they were able to upload new firmware into the engine control units. Their conclusion is that vehicle embedded systems are not design…
Thank you for finding that link, I was trying to find this[1] presentation for my comment, but couldn't.
[1] - http://users.cis.fiu.edu/~carbunar/teaching/cis5374/slides/a...
This looks very promising. Good potential for affordable fleet-tracking. I'm also excited to see a local (Vancouver) company with such a polished offer. I'll be following this one closely.