[HN Gopher] Ford F-150 Lightning: Fast Truck, Slow Computer
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Ford F-150 Lightning: Fast Truck, Slow Computer
Author : stalfosknight
Score : 65 points
Date : 2022-08-16 18:14 UTC (4 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.theverge.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.theverge.com)
| ggm wrote:
| What is the balance of experience between touch,
| aural/tactile/visua push response on screens, and actual physical
| buttons which go "click" and light up?
|
| I think the place we know most about this, is the Aircraft space.
| I am interested because I used to live in 'press it go click'
| world and now live half-blessed by a car with some controls which
| are real and a lot of controls which are soft, and I have to say
| I don't entirely like the experience.
|
| When you look at a Concorde control deck, its a 3 man (4 man?)
| crew, and its unbelievably complex. The replacement in a current
| spec Boeing or Airbus is simpler, but it's hardly one touch
| screen.
|
| Tesla has gone off the deep end.
| jconley wrote:
| Can confirm. I have an F-150 Lightning. The UI sucks and is slow.
| Much worse than my Teslas. It takes like 30 seconds when I get in
| the truck and turn it on before it's even usable. Switching
| between CarPlay and the native interface is ridiculous. It's a
| great truck though. Love it. :) AMA.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| One of these days we will have big enough batteries to power a
| superduty a reasonable distance. I can't wait. I've loved my
| EVs, now I want that for my F250.
| Rooster61 wrote:
| It's incredibly frustrating to me that buying a vehicle with a
| pushbutton, working, reliable interface is becoming increasingly
| impossible to do. Why is UX so horrifically bad in the vehicle
| space? Is it poor management decisions or a shortage of good UX
| engineers? I get that lumping everything into the touchscreen can
| be a cheaper option to build, but I'd GLADLY pay for a different
| option. I don't understand it.
| bonestamp2 wrote:
| A lot of automakers are chasing Tesla's one screen design --
| they're so envious of the cost savings there. Except the
| Germans, they're still putting in lots of buttons and knobs --
| my next car will likely be German because they seem to
| understand what people actually want.
| qbrass wrote:
| Hope it's not a new Golf. VW did more damage to their
| reputation with that interior than from Dieselgate.
| CamperBob2 wrote:
| Buy it quick. Even the Macan has a stupid piano-black console
| touch panel in its current generation.
| ct0 wrote:
| My previous version Porsche (958) has a button for newly
| every function. Its very similar to a small plane and it
| 100% allows me to focus on the road and whats important
| without looking at the change of function.
| bonestamp2 wrote:
| Ya, that's the fault of journalists always complaining
| about "blank" panels. The former Porsche solution to that
| was better than this new panel.
| ajross wrote:
| Have you driven a Tesla much? The general UX intent is that
| you're not supposed to need to interact with the screen while
| driving. Wipers are automatic, lights are automatic (both can
| be pulsed with the stalks of course). Virtually everything
| responds to voice commands ("Play Stairway to Heaven",
| "Navigate to Albertsons", "Set temperature to 72", etc...).
| All this stuff works really well.
|
| I won't engage with "what people actually want" except to
| point to sales figures, I guess. Everyone likes different
| stuff. But the point is that Tesla is winning in this space
| because they're handing people an outside-the-box solution.
| Asking for "lots of buttons and knobs" is just demanding the
| older solution. That doesn't say the older solution is wrong,
| but it does argue that maybe you're failing to understand the
| new paradigm.
| bjelkeman-again wrote:
| I think it is because A)Good UX is hard and there is a shortage
| of people who have experience a mixed hardware/software UX. B)
| Car companies are rather old fashioned in setting their
| priorities. They haven't caught on yet at management level that
| the modern car is a different beast and needs different
| priorities when designing and engineering. C) A car company is
| big. It takes a long time to change, and a lot of people are
| really sceptical and don't believe the future needs to be
| different.
| TylerE wrote:
| None of that.
|
| Costs.
|
| Buttons are expensive, and additional points of failure.
| Cheaper to just cram everything into a touchscreen.
| guntars wrote:
| Yet the cars are more expensive than ever. Nah, it's a bet by
| the management that people don't actually choose a car based
| on the polish of the infotainment system.
| sliken wrote:
| Maybe not, but I've done the opposite. The BMW, Subaru, and
| Fords I tried had terrible interfaces and I ruled them out.
| In particular BMW's i-drive seems to be hated by many.
|
| Tesla on the other hand has buttons for many things, horn,
| turn signals, activate the windshield wipers for a moment
| (I use auto that handles most needs), engage cruise
| control, set following distance when using cruise control,
| high beams, pause music, music volume, etc.
|
| Sure seat heaters, interior temp, ac, defrosting etc
| require touch screen use (or leaving them on auto), but
| those are emergencies and not much different than having to
| hit one of 8 buttons/dials on a center console. Especially
| since most are single touch, not touch -> select menu ->
| hit button.
|
| While I find the above not annoying I really love the 15"
| screen that devotes the majority of the screen to things
| around the car (lane markers, cars, motorcycles, traffic
| cones, trucks, pedestrians, etc) and the map (with
| traffic). If the car sees a problem it blinks that object
| red, which I find helpful. Sure if I want I can get an inch
| for the current song. But generally I feel more
| situationally aware with a nice big nav screen up. On more
| than one occasion I've seen motorcycles splitting lanes
| behind me because of motion on the screen before I notice
| the noise or see them in the mirrors. I also really miss
| the current speed limit on the screen when I switch cars.
|
| I also really like being able to say "play pink floyd", or
| "navigate to ...".
| TylerE wrote:
| You're not really arguing with logic, there. How do you
| know a car with lots of buttons wouldn't cost even more?
| akira2501 wrote:
| > Why is UX so horrifically bad in the vehicle space?
|
| It used to be that vehicle radio units were entirely
| replaceable. There was a relatively healthy aftermarket, and
| quite a few shops that would actually do the installations for
| you. There used to be a lot more competition here, but I think
| with the general increase in quality of speaker systems
| combined with smart phones and the much higher level of system
| integration through the head unit effectively killed it.
|
| Hence.. you get what you buy. In a sense, the manufacturer has
| a monopoly on your dash that they didn't traditionally have.
| mint2 wrote:
| Cars seating is horrible and bad for backs. Trends, tradition
| and short term cost decide most design considerations not
| practicality or what's best.
| kayodelycaon wrote:
| Depends on the car and the person. I have back problems and
| almost no office chairs are usable for me. I can easily drive
| 10 hours in my car with no issues. Sometimes, my back feels
| better after a drive that long.
| bink wrote:
| It reminds me of cell phone interfaces back before the iPhone.
| I had high hopes that Carplay would motivate the vendors to put
| some effort into their own interfaces but sadly that doesn't
| appear to have happened.
| bowsamic wrote:
| The entire auto industry is driven by hype and trends rather
| than functionality
| 7952 wrote:
| Yes. Just look at the appalling forward blind spot on a lot
| of trucks and SUVs. Or the way cars have become taller at the
| expense of aerodynamics.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| People like sitting higher up, or do not like being seated
| lower, or so much lower, than others.
|
| It might also be safer to be in a higher up car in the
| event of a collision.
|
| Pretty much all the families I know with young kids and
| toddlers has a full size SUV. Every time I ask why they did
| not get a minivan such as Odyssey or Sienna, every response
| is they like SUVs and do not want to sit lower in the
| minivan. Even though the minivan has better fuel economy,
| seats more people with more legroom, and has more cargo
| space, the answer is still SUV is cooler than minivans.
|
| I even see families who live with elderly parents prefer to
| drive two SUVs (or 1 SUV and 1 pickup truck) somewhere with
| 3 to 4 people in each, rather than have one minivan to be
| able to transport all 7 or 8 at the same time. And these
| same families growing up went everywhere in minivans
| because it was the most economic way, but now that they can
| afford SUVs, that is what they choose to use.
| LAC-Tech wrote:
| > People like sitting higher up, or do not like being
| seated lower, or so much lower, than others.
|
| Most of my driving is on country roads in a mountainous
| area, with some very tight turns.
|
| I'm going to rent out an SUV soon and see what it's like
| taking sharp turns with a high vehicle. I suspect it
| sucks but who knows.
| davidw wrote:
| This "arms race" is piling up stacks and stacks of
| bodies.
| 7952 wrote:
| I know two couples who both started out with small
| efficient cars. And then had to upgrade because they
| could not fit a stroller in the back. It feels like car
| companies just want to have skews that are intentionally
| compromised to push people into the next tier. When most
| people just need a compact sedan.
| LAC-Tech wrote:
| I can fit a stroller in the back of my subcompact.
|
| Granted I'm not able to go grocery shopping at the same
| time..
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Yet most people who can afford to, choose to buy larger
| vehicles than they need.
|
| Car manufacturers are not shaping people's desires, they
| are simply delivering them what they want.
|
| A Corolla/civic continues to be available for purchase.
| Yet people want to sit higher up, so you see the vast
| increase in sales for RAV4/CRV.
|
| https://www.statista.com/statistics/276506/change-in-us-
| car-...
| WorldMaker wrote:
| The corolla/civic buyers seem to be on a longer planning
| horizon than the RAV4/CRV buyers. It's tough to compare
| sales apples to sales oranges when new car buyers on
| average buy sedans on 10-15 year schedules and SUVs on
| roughly 5 year schedules.
|
| That planning horizon differential alone is enough to
| explain why car manufacturers would be greater
| incentivized to iterate on SUVs faster than sedans and
| include more features. Iteration and feature
| differentials will contribute as much to sales choices as
| "sit higher up" will, acting as a reinforcement in the
| cycle/spiral towards larger vehicles.
|
| Car manufacturers aren't incentivized enough to lengthen
| their own planning horizons or otherwise better
| accommodate "sensible" sedan drivers, and it becomes very
| easy to pretend they don't exist and chase the short-term
| profits of the faster cycle time (especially when pushed
| by quarterly-earnings focused shareholders).
| jackmott wrote:
| nine_k wrote:
| I wonder if third-party infotainment with buttons and otherwise
| ergonomic, reliable UI is legally possible. If so, it could be
| a viable business?
| subsubzero wrote:
| I don't know if its just me but electric trucks/cars and the
| buying experience there is one giant pit of frustration. I want
| to buy a electric truck, was thinking of a Rivian, but good luck
| getting one in the next 2-3 years. And if you do manage to get
| one watch out for your axel coming apart! [1], maybe I will get a
| lightning, looks like same leadtime issues, 2 years+ wait and
| they are totally changing the brain(from ford to android) so the
| ones now will be obsolete.
|
| Also from tesla to rivian all I hear are horror stories about the
| service, and tesla's build quality is nowhere near any of the
| traditional automakers(fit and finish). I just want to buy a
| reliable electric truck or suv that has a decent finish and don't
| want to wait 2-3 years, someone please take my money!
|
| [1] - https://www.rivianforums.com/forum/threads/rivian-r1t-cv-
| axl...
| rnk wrote:
| There's one thing you can do to have a shot at getting a rivian
| quicker. Spec one out that matches the current launch edition
| (4 motors, don't get the ocean coast interior, get the tonneau
| cover) and you might just get one. People have gotten them in a
| couple of months, but they are lucky. Go to the
| reddit.com/r/rivian forum and read people's descriptions. What
| seems to happen is they have some ready for a location and
| someone at the last minute drops out and they can't find
| someone so they can go way down the list quickly.
| treesknees wrote:
| What you're asking for just doesn't exist yet. The marketing
| teams at these companies are clearly doing a great job selling
| these vehicles as reliable simple alternatives to ICE-powered,
| but that's just not the case.
|
| Ignoring all of the supply-chain issues from the pandemic
| lockdowns (shipping, chip shortages, labor shortages, etc.)
| you're still purchasing new technology that will take years to
| iron out the quality problems. I've friends who work in the
| automotive industry in various engineering roles and none of
| them are driving brand-new platforms because they know better.
| Just like the software world, manufacturers will take all of
| the maintenance data from dealerships and use it to improve the
| design and production. If you're OK with being the beta tester
| filing bug reports in this relationship, by all means, buy an
| electric truck.
| rnk wrote:
| I'll agree with that. Yet I alsonever want to buy anything
| from an enforced middleman again. First I avoided that with
| Tesla, and now I did it with Rivian. It does have some bugs,
| so did my last car I bought 20 years ago form a major
| manufacturer.
| croutonwagon wrote:
| The enforced middle man gives you a place to hold
| accountable or to physically complain to. And provides
| local jobs. Not to mention the infrastructure to handle
| things like recalls.
|
| People complain about Tesla service but actively want MORE
| faceless corps not held accountable to sell them things. It
| makes no sense.
| kcb wrote:
| Hold accountable a local area businessman with political
| connections. What could possibly go wrong?
| kodah wrote:
| > The result is that the software experience of the Lightning
| often feels trapped in the past, with no clear path to the future
| because Ford's real software efforts lie elsewhere.
|
| I have a Ford Fusion. The software has remained essentially
| untouched since I bought it. They rely almost entirely on Android
| Auto, which has it's own host of bugs and incompatibilities.
|
| There's a primary learning from Tesla to be made here:
| infotainment is a core part of the business. Build it in house.
| itsoktocry wrote:
| > _Ford's entire suite of driver-assistance tech is called
| "BlueCruise," which is deeply confusing because it means that
| everything from boring old cruise control to full-on hands-free
| driving is technically "BlueCruise."_
|
| This seems far less confusing than the Autopilot and FSD
| bifurcation that Tesla has.
|
| It beeps at you to get your hands on the wheel when you're trying
| to autosteer in places it's not allowed. Sounds reasonable, no?
| warty_affrays wrote:
| Do you think it would be more or less confusing if Autopilot
| and FSD were both called them same name?
| [deleted]
| johnklos wrote:
| Android? So now our cars will stop working and/or will become
| hopelessly insecure when Google and Ford decide to stop updating
| them?
| SiempreViernes wrote:
| Wait, there exists mass market cars with secure software?
| johnklos wrote:
| pkulak wrote:
| I'm firmly in the camp that it's not patriotic to stylize the
| American flag in any way... but I'd love it if you expanded
| on how this version is racist.
| LeoPanthera wrote:
| The "thin blue line" flag is used almost exclusively by the
| far-right, and more specifically by white supremacists.
|
| The flag on the Lightning isn't that flag, but it does
| resemble it.
| namecheapTA wrote:
| And here I was thinking it was used by people that
| appreciate their local police force and understand the
| stresses they are under.
| pkulak wrote:
| Oh interesting. Just looked it up, and the thin blue line
| flag is black and white. Don't think I've ever seen a
| black and white American flag before.
| davidw wrote:
| I'm not up on all the details, but those grayed out flags
| do seem to have some particular associations. Nothing
| wrong with a regular old flag IMO.
| tablespoon wrote:
| > ...the Mustang Mach-E and the Lightning have a 15.5-inch
| portrait center screen running Sync 4A, which is the same as Sync
| 4 with the addition of touchscreen climate controls and widgets
| that fill out the vertical height of the display.
|
| Why??? Climate controls should not be on a touchscreen. Display
| is fine, but control is not. Just leave space for some knobs and
| a mode switch.
| foxyv wrote:
| I don't know about the F150 Lightning, but the Fords I've seen
| all use a HOTAS style setup where the climate, radio, etc...
| are all controlled by buttons on the steering wheel. The
| touchscreen is more for passengers.
| russb wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HOTAS
|
| "HOTAS, an acronym of hands on throttle-and-stick"
| bri3d wrote:
| It's been 10+ years since cars have gotten screwed in the
| Consumer Reports and other outlets for bad infotainment.
|
| What's the fix? VW's MIB2/MIB2.5 was pretty much the pinnacle of
| automotive head unit innovation, IMHO, and it wasn't due to the
| technology - it's QNX and J9 Java like so many head units before
| it. It just... worked, which seems a bridge too far for modern
| infotainment.
|
| I think C+D and other outlets need to start scoring cars based on
| their head units, or at least considering them. Much like tires,
| it's clear that these venues have enough power to bend the
| industry to some extent.
| WhitneyLand wrote:
| Any way to wire up 3rd party hardware buttons / switchgear?
|
| I don't know if there's any API access for non-critical
| functionality like climate control.
| throw03172019 wrote:
| They strapped on an Android tablet and called it a day. From my
| experience (ex-mobile game dev, Medical SaaS), Android tablets
| are very slow. We encourage our customers to not buy Android
| tablets because the patient experience is not the greatest.
| pkulak wrote:
| It has to be an automotive-grade screen or one afternoon in a
| Phoenix parking lot will be the end of it. It's absolutely not
| a tablet, or even a part from one.
| markus92 wrote:
| Not even Android, according to the article. That's coming next
| year, now it's a proprietary Ford system.
| sjm-lbm wrote:
| Current versions of the Ford infotainment platform are based on
| QNX, actually. The article mentions that Ford is switching to
| Android, but that hasn't happened yet.
| HWR_14 wrote:
| Why is Ford switching away from a RTOS with a great history
| in the automotive space to try to force me to have something
| to do with Google?
| rektide wrote:
| Because there's a vibrant ecosystem around Android with
| wonderful third party support, with a rich platform &
| ecosystem already well known & loved by many developers &
| consumers alike. Where-as QNX is a toolkit for building
| one-off custom appliances that no third party will ever see
| or improve or enrich. One is a dead end stuck in a niche,
| the other realized it had to create more value than it
| captured. And generally the Google open ecosystem one is
| pretty ok.
| HWR_14 wrote:
| Why would I want third party support, a rich platform or
| an ecosystem? I want a radio and something that plays
| what my cellphone tells it. That's it.
| uncletaco wrote:
| Well that's you, somebody else might want to use the
| subscription music service they pay for and use car
| controls to change the tracks, someone else might want a
| map that displays in the center console as opposed to
| their phone, etc etc. With android there's the
| possibility of adding apps that people would want to the
| car itself. This would be something device manufacturers
| could be interested in for dash cams or other electronics
| that could benefit from richer control interfaces.
| NotYourLawyer wrote:
| Android is cheaper because it hoovers up the "owner's"
| data.
| rnk wrote:
| That may be, but it wins because it's vastly better than
| all the alternatives, except tesla or a few other leading
| 'new car companies' like rivian.
| HWR_14 wrote:
| How on earth is it "better"? Dumb cars are better.
| Obviously, I want the EV to have mission critical things
| related to it being an EV, but there's no reason for
| anything else to get fancy.
|
| Tesla has the worst cockpit experience because it's a
| single large screen.
| prepend wrote:
| It's not as good as my dumb bmw "connected drive" from 5
| years ago.
| ubermonkey wrote:
| This is one of those things I'll never experience, and doubly so:
| I have no use for a truck (I live in a city), and I have never
| owned or wanted to own an American-made car. They're just all so
| _bad_.
| [deleted]
| prepend wrote:
| > but also a stopgap as Ford resets its entire software strategy
| around Android in partnership with Google.
|
| This doesn't seem like a good idea because there are Android
| people and iOS people. Alienating a large swath of customers is
| not a good idea.
|
| That and I don't want Google monitoring all my car data. One of
| the big reasons I don't have a Tesla is their data policy. But
| I'd rather Tesla have my data than Google because at least it
| won't be linked to everything else about me.
|
| Also, I want to drive cars for 10 or 20 years. Google has never
| maintained Android for that long.
|
| I'd rather just have an embedded os written and maintained by
| ford (that doesn't suck).
| ledauphin wrote:
| no car company "maintains" their embedded software, either.
|
| updates do happen, but there are no guarantees, no
| transparency, and essentially no aftermarket options for most
| modern cars.
| olivermarks wrote:
| Right now automotive UI's and sw are in the equivalent of pre
| iphone era mobile phone jankyness, just good at one or two things
| with a ton of cruft that doesn't work well.
|
| We all know BEVs are fast - even a 1960's UK electric milkfloat
| is amazingly speedy from standstill - but I'd say Ford are years
| away from their BEVs being viable and reliable, not least due to
| lack of charging network. The lousy towing performances on BEV
| trucks rings alarm bells too.
| https://www.motortrend.com/reviews/ford-f150-lightning-elect...
|
| A little off topic but it appears Anne Heche's vehicle was a
| hybrid or BEV and caused a huge fire, one of my biggest BEV
| concerns - It took nearly 60 firefighters more than an hour to
| douse the flames.
|
| https://www.usatoday.com/story/entertainment/celebrities/202...
| recursive wrote:
| Anecdotal, but I just drove my electric Ford from Sacramento to
| Seattle and back without any particular planning or problems.
| Just used the built-in nav to find chargers.
| olivermarks wrote:
| truck or car? loaded or empty?
| cpwright wrote:
| The lousy towing performance probably doesn't matter. 75% of
| truck owners tow one time a year or less. I've had my F-150 for
| 8 years 45,000 miles, and it's seen a trailer 3 times for a
| total of less than 400 miles. I'm close to being in the market
| for a new truck, and the biggest deal breaker for me with the
| lightning is the 5.5' box instead of the 6.5' box. Weighing
| over 6,000 lbs also means you can't register it as a passenger
| vehicle in NYS without capping it - meaning you can't drive on
| the parkways.
|
| https://www.thedrive.com/news/26907/you-dont-need-a-full-siz...
| rnk wrote:
| There were news articles that they revised this law for the
| rivian and presumably the f150ev. At first people ran into
| this weight / registration issue.
| matwood wrote:
| I want my next truck to be an EV, but towing does matter to
| me. I hope by the time I replace my 2007 Tundra there will be
| an EV truck that does tow well. I just broke 130k miles, and
| easily have another 100k, so I have some time.
| twobitshifter wrote:
| With the performance of this and other EVs now beating the Raptor
| pickup, do you think we'll start to see performance regulated for
| safety reasons? A massive pickup able to 0-60 in a few seconds is
| cool, but in the hands of the less responsible it sounds like a
| huge safety risk. We cap the performance of tiny scooters but
| multiton trucks are able to go as fast as humanly possible?
| davidw wrote:
| Massive, heavy trucks with a blind spot, the ability to
| accelerate very rapidly, and a fiddly screen that you need to
| use even for the most basic of things like heating and cooling.
|
| What could possibly go wrong...
| [deleted]
| namecheapTA wrote:
| Atleast when a Dodge Charger is charging up from behind, I can
| hear the thing. Pedestrians can hear the thing.
|
| When the demographic that currently commits most reckless
| driving eventually adopts electric cars, it's going to be a
| blood bath.
| kkfx wrote:
| Cars OEMs know (in general, more or less) how to build cars. In
| electronics tend to be crappy at best in IT terms they are like
| classic dumb users, except they actually design crapware.
|
| It's not much Ford, it's ANY OEMs I know of...
| bottlepalm wrote:
| (except Tesla who actually has their own hardware, software,
| dev team and frequently pushes updates for years)
| colechristensen wrote:
| Do fleet versions of new cars/trucks also have stupid
| touchscreens in them?
|
| Like a new F-450, is it driven by a shitty android tablet too?
| r00fus wrote:
| Does it do CarPlay/Android Auto? If that's the case, I honestly
| don't really care how fast it is - I have an older EV with Sync3
| and it's fine (more than fine, I just use my smartphone for most
| interactions using CarPlay).
|
| The only thing I may dislike is not having physical buttons/dials
| for climate.
| aaronbrethorst wrote:
| this is addressed in the article. You can just Cmd/Ctrl+F for
| the word CarPlay for an answer. There's a
| quick action button to navigate back home on the map widget,
| but it just opens the map app full-screen, defeating the
| purpose of the widget entirely. I'd love to have CarPlay open
| to handle my phone and messaging alongside the radio, but
| that's not possible, even though the display is clearly big
| enough to show both at once. All of that is made
| worse by how slow everything is. Switching between the radio
| and the map or the map and CarPlay is... slow. Swiping along
| the cards is pretty slow. The display can be responsive, and
| the games are certainly playable, but in most instances, it's
| just slow. This is the point in any car review
| where many people are already drafting emails to me about just
| using CarPlay or Android Auto instead of the stock software,
| but friends, CarPlay and Android Auto are not good at helping
| EV owners navigate charging. If you want to plot out a route
| with accurate range estimates and an effective charging
| strategy, you have to use the built-in nav -- especially since
| Ford has taken the time to organize charging stations by speed,
| and seeking out 150kW fast chargers is an important part of the
| Lightning experience because the battery is so big. Apple and
| Google are a long way behind on this front.
| master_crab wrote:
| "If you want to plot out a route with accurate range
| estimates and an effective charging strategy, you have to use
| the built-in nav"
|
| I saw that phrase in the story and came here to comment and
| saw this thread.
|
| I think we should be honest with ourselves about recent
| history: Apple and Google will be quicker to roll out
| functionality for EV specific navigation (i.e. chargers) in
| their apps then car manufacturers will be to fix their UI
| problems.
|
| Edit: I also dont want to spend $xxx a year on map updates
| from manufacturers when Apple Maps are free (I understand I'm
| not the customer with Google even if their mapping product is
| great) and better
| filoleg wrote:
| > _I think we should be honest with ourselves about recent
| history: Apple and Google will be quicker to roll out
| functionality for EV specific navigation (i.e. chargers) in
| their apps then car manufacturers will be to fix their UI
| problems._
|
| I think you are missing the point of what the actual
| problem here is. Apple and Google already show EV charging
| stations on their maps just fine, you can even filter by
| type of charging (CCS, CHADeMO, etc.). That's not the
| issue.
|
| The issue is the navigation system using information about
| your vehicle in real time (current outside temperature[0],
| battery charge remaining, speed, AC usage, calculated
| estimate of distance of range remaining using all the info
| above, etc.) to automatically create a route to your final
| destination that includes charging station stops on the
| way. To calculate the frequency of those stops, locations,
| how long you will need to spend charging there in the most
| optimal way (e.g., it is actually much faster to make 2
| stops to charge from 15% to 50% than to stop 1 time to
| charge from 15% to to 85%), you need real time data about
| your own vehicle specifically.
|
| Unless Google and Apple somehow get access to that live
| data from the vehicle itself in real time, that
| functionality is impossible to implement. And, naturally,
| the only entity that would have that info is the car nav
| system itself. Plus, I don't think many users would be
| enthusiastic about sharing such sensitive information with
| Apple or Google.
|
| 0. In case anyone is curious why outside temperature is
| relevant, EVs take outside temperature into their
| calculation of estimated range, because lower temperatures
| reduce range available.
| kevinsundar wrote:
| It's coming:
| https://www.gearpatrol.com/cars/a40217409/new-apple-
| carplay/
| filoleg wrote:
| Thanks for the link. I had no idea CarPlay was not only
| planning to go in that direction, but have already done
| the work to make it happen, and are fairly close to
| releasing it soon. Their car manufacturer partnerships
| look pretty solid as well.
|
| Still, late 2023 as of now seems a bit far out. But I
| don't think that majority of car manufacturers will
| manage to get to the CarPlay level of quality for their
| own in-house infotainment systems even by 2033.
| master_crab wrote:
| You got there in the end ;)
| vel0city wrote:
| EVs with Google's software native like the Polestar have
| that functionality. Google Maps _can_ do it, its more of
| a limitation of the current Android Auto implementation.
|
| I wonder if Android Auto would be able to get this data
| with the current structure of Android Auto, or if
| existing cars would never be able to support it.
| causi wrote:
| _I also dont want to spend $xxx a year on map updates from
| manufacturers when Apple Maps are free (I understand I'm
| not the customer with Google even if their mapping product
| is great) and better_
|
| I visibly jerked in my chair reading that from remembering
| all the GPS devices I relied on for years that happily
| bricked themselves after the company stopped supporting
| them and their internal maps "expired".
| rnk wrote:
| Tesla gave free map updates. It seems everything is much
| better if you just move away from the legacy automakers
| for ui.
| eneumann wrote:
| As a cyclist, I'm super excited about one day being run over by
| one of these things. The giant vehicle trend is getting a lot of
| people killed.
|
| And why does any vehicle need to accelerate that quickly? It's
| irresponsible on public roads. I would really love to see
| acceleration and speed limiters on vehicles.
| _dain_ wrote:
| agreed on everything except acceleration
| andrewla wrote:
| Generally speaking the horrifying quality of Ford's electronics
| have been enough to keep me away from even considering purchasing
| one. Absolutely nothing works right and certainly nothing works
| well. It may or may not be able to connect bluetooth, it may or
| may not acknowledge a USB device, it may or may not start blaring
| whatever FM station was last tuned in for no reason on startup,
| or start playing the first album on your phone. Phone audio will
| sometimes play as media, and sometimes show up as phone calls.
| And of course, cripplingly slow, which for a touchscreen is
| deadly -- you have no idea whether or not the system even
| realized that you pressed it, and when you mash the button more
| than once you may find that you've clicked a button on a not-yet-
| visible-screen. Absolute garbage.
|
| Mazda is apparently taking the right approach here -- increasing
| the tactile buttons on the dash and console, and ditching
| touchscreens.
|
| Really, cars should just have a built-in phone mount and
| connectors, and just let the phone do pretty much everything. If
| Ford wants to have a map of charging stations, partner with Apple
| or Google (or Waze) or build their own OSM-based maps app. Apple
| CarPlay and Android Auto are okay-ish, but frankly I find the
| experience of just having the phone on a mount and using that as
| the display to be far superior in almost every way.
| pkulak wrote:
| Doesn't the article literally mentioning them partnering with
| Google and using Android Automotive instead of their own UI?
| I'd guess they know all too well about everything you mentioned
| and have given up.
| NotYourLawyer wrote:
| They may have given up, but you can't buy the new version
| yet.
| PaulWaldman wrote:
| >Mazda is apparently taking the right approach here --
| increasing the tactile buttons on the dash and console, and
| ditching touchscreens.
|
| Huh? After using both Ford's (2022 Explorer) and Mazda's (2022
| CX-7) infotainment systems recently for several weeks, I
| couldn't disagree more.
|
| Android Auto and CarPlay interfaces were designed for
| touchscreen control. Mazda forcing the use of a wheel, like a
| joystick is a safety hazard. Turing the wheel unpredictably
| selects objects on the screen, forcing you to keep your eyes
| off the road while you keep turning the wheel until the item
| you need is selected. In Ford's system, a quick glace us all
| that's required.
|
| What good is tactile feedback when you have no idea what you're
| adjusting without staring at the screen?
| wyldfire wrote:
| I have a 2020 Mazda 6 and I love the safety focus of its
| infotainment. But the ludicrously bad latency is infuriating.
| Button presses - especially <change radio station +/-> will
| sometimes get buffered for 10/20s and sometimes they're
| ignored altogether.
| genocidicbunny wrote:
| > Turing the wheel unpredictably selects objects on the
| screen, forcing you to keep your eyes off the road while you
| keep turning the wheel until the item you need is selected.
|
| You shouldn't need to do anything requiring the wheel while
| you're driving though. All the controls that you would want
| to have accessible while you're driving are physical (climate
| control, basic media/phone controls.) For everything else you
| should be setting that up while you're parked.
| elzbardico wrote:
| Usually me an my wife take turns driving. And we have a
| tacit agreement that the passenger control this kind of
| stuff. So, if I am driving, I ask my wife to set a
| destination on the GPS, play some music, change the
| temperature, and when she is driving I become the
| navigator/flight-engineer. Having those controls in the
| wheel would be incredibly annoying for us.
| genocidicbunny wrote:
| In my Mazda, the climate controls are physical, but in
| the center console, and easily accessible to both driver
| and front passenger. The wheel-based controls are things
| like skip forward/backward, bring up voice input, or end
| call. That's also about the extent of things I consider
| the driver should be focusing on. When I was younger, on
| family trips, even climate control was something
| relegated to the passenger; Even for the driver side.
|
| I consider putting in a destination on the GPS, or
| setting up my music playlist to be 'park the car' types
| of things if simply doing it via voice control doesn't
| work.
| karamanolev wrote:
| Yet, it's not what people are doing. The UIs of cars and
| other objects should take into account how they're going to
| be used, not how they are designed to be used. It's been
| proven again and again that you can only marginally educate
| or tell people how to behave. It's better to make a system
| that is safe 7/10 in real world usage, instead of one
| designed for 9/10, but actually getting 5/10.
| lttlrck wrote:
| Both hands staying on the steering wheel is a _huge_
| plus. And the inputs are stepwise and therefore less
| prone to error, so safer.
|
| And then there is Siri which makes all the things that
| you might want to do while driving, and probably
| shouldn't (touchscreen or not) far easier and safer.
|
| How is a touchscreen safer?
| stonogo wrote:
| The solution to "stupid people won't keep their eyes on
| the road while driving" is not "force everyone else to
| take their eyes off the road as well."
| andrewla wrote:
| Wow, that sounds intensely bad!
|
| I haven't actually driven a Mazda, I just heard that they
| were getting rid of touchscreens and it honestly didn't occur
| to me that they'd try to shoehorn full Android Auto or
| CarPlay into that. I just assumed that they would have a
| minimal interface and let your phone do the work, and then
| have "next track" and "previous track" buttons and a volume
| knob, plus climate control and stuff, and the screen would
| just have various car information; tire pressure and fuel
| efficiency and various camera systems for parking.
|
| It might still work for me (I'm definitely going to test
| drive a Mazda when my current car needs replacing), but this
| is me; I disable CarPlay because I can't stand it; I prefer
| to just put my phone on a mount and use it directly; I just
| need the car systems as a speaker for the phone.
| izacus wrote:
| I own a Mazda and using Android Auto with physical controls
| works just fine, no idea what the OP is talking about. All
| the main driving features are accessible by buttons and
| don't need eyes off the road.
|
| It's a massive difference in compasion to some brands that
| require you to use touchscreen to switch to next track or
| adjust AC temp.
| vel0city wrote:
| Which cars have touchscreens and don't have steering
| wheel media controls?
| syzar wrote:
| Volvo and Ford Edge use touchscreens to adjust AC and
| there is no steering wheel control for it.
| vel0city wrote:
| Changing the AC, even with physical controls, is a
| distraction from driving. I don't get why anyone drives
| without it being on auto climate as you're inviting more
| distractions. If its on auto climate why are you making
| adjustments while you drive?
| izacus wrote:
| Renault Zoe was the last one I've drove with that
| annoying issue (at least the model I had).
|
| There was also a BMW Series 1, that requred selecting a
| media page in dashboard screen and then selecting a next
| track button. (No support for Auto on that one tho.)
| vel0city wrote:
| Interesting. It seems like almost all cars sold in the US
| these days have steering wheel media controls, even
| cheaper base models. It feels like you'd have to go out
| of your way to find one that doesn't have it.
| 0x457 wrote:
| > Android Auto and CarPlay interfaces were designed for
| touchscreen control. Mazda forcing the use of a wheel, like a
| joystick is a safety hazard.
|
| What? How is it a safety hazard? I'm far more distracted
| trying to touch the button on display or scroll in my
| Wrangler, than using a wheel in my Miata. Selection is
| extremely predictable and always the same order, it's a basic
| accessibility feature of android.
|
| I enjoy using the knob with android auto far more than touch
| screen, specifically because I don't have to move eyes of the
| road or have a hand in an uncomfortable position trying to
| touch something on the screen.
|
| Plus, switching between navigation and media is a press of a
| button that is always in the same space - next to the knob.
| Compared to touchscreen... And on top of everything, it
| remembers which navigation/media I'm using, so switching
| between radio and android auto navigation is a single button
| press.
|
| It's like one of the important features why my last two cars
| were mazdas.
| twblalock wrote:
| > What good is tactile feedback when you have no idea what
| you're adjusting without staring at the screen?
|
| This is what people don't understand about touchscreen vs
| dial-based UIs. One is not safer than the other if they both
| require you to take your eyes off the road and look at a
| screen!
|
| If car makers want to have a button control a feature, then
| they should simply make a button that controls that feature.
| Cars worked that way for many years. Buttons, dials, or
| trackpads that move a cursor or select items on a screen are
| slower than touch-based UIs, require at least as much driver
| attention, and are less ergonomic than just putting your
| finger on the exact item you want.
| vel0city wrote:
| The idea with the touchscreen controls is that the driver
| shouldn't really be using the touchscreen at all while
| driving except as a quick reference to the map.
|
| You're not supposed to be using the screen to adjust your
| media while driving, there's steering wheel and voice
| controls.
|
| You're not supposed to be adjusting the climate controls
| while moving, auto climate should just handle it. Why would
| I _want_ to be distracted by needing to change the climate
| controls? I shouldn 't have to adjust them while the
| vehicle is in motion.
| twblalock wrote:
| I doubt that was actually the intention, and even if it
| was, we all know that's not how people actually use their
| cars.
| vel0city wrote:
| Yeah, they drive while holding their phones on
| speakerphone while talking into it like they're about to
| take a bite out of a sandwich.
|
| Other than volume and next track/station, just about any
| other media control is going to have my hand off the
| wheel for a bit and probably require me to look at what
| its doing even if its all just a bunch of buttons and
| knobs. Like what, change which folder I'm in? Change to a
| different playlist? Choose a different app entirely? None
| of that is going to be done by just feeling around the
| dashboard.
|
| And as mentioned, I'd probably return any car that I have
| to adjust the climate more than once a quarter. Every car
| I've owned for over 20 years has been able to keep its
| climate consistent and comfortable without the need for
| me to make adjustments for months on end. Why would I
| want to be distracted making minute adjustments to the
| climate settings while I drive? Why would I _want_ to
| have to change the mode or turn it to more heat or more
| cool or turn the AC compressor on or off while I drive?
| Shouldn 't it just be able to figure out if the car is
| cold turn up the heat and if the car is hot turn on the
| AC compressor? Wouldn't it know the optimal way to cool
| itself? Shouldn't it be able to figure out the best fan
| speed to keep the climate as programmed ahead of time?
|
| Honestly, why should I even have to tell my car to turn
| on the heated seats? I don't need to on one of my cars,
| it turns it on automatically when its cold outside.
| treeman79 wrote:
| I can operate basically anything by touch in the car other
| than the touchscreen.
| Swizec wrote:
| > Buttons, dials, or trackpads that move a cursor or select
| items on a screen are slower than touch-based UIs, require
| at least as much driver attention, and are less ergonomic
| than just putting your finger on the exact item you want
|
| Mercedes does this really well. I was surprised.
|
| You can use the screen as a touchscreen, or there's a dial
| thingy on the armrest that lets you scroll around the UI by
| flicking your fingers. Similar to keyboard navigation on
| computers.
|
| The end result is a touchscreen you can use effectively
| when stationary and an easy-to-use control for when you're
| moving and need to deal with your arm moving relative to
| the car. And the sequence of UI selections are intuitive
| enough that after 20min you can do it almost without
| looking.
|
| My understanding is they've been working on this combo for
| 10+ years. Newer models (since ~2018) have a full on
| touchpad instead of the wheel.
|
| https://www.carmagazine.co.uk/car-news/tech/mercedes-mbux-
| in...
| elzbardico wrote:
| I refuse to believe an UX professional or even a programmer
| ever thought this could be a good idea. It must have been
| pushed down the throats of the designers and developers by an
| edict from some point-haired MBA.
| syzar wrote:
| I recently got a Mazda CX-5. Previous car was a Ford Escape.
| I much prefer Mazda's approach. The touchscreen on the Ford
| was a pain to use after several years. I think the screen's
| touch sensitivity degrades over time. I don't know. It was
| especially bad in winter. I haven't owned the Mazda long
| enough to know if the joystick will degrade much over time
| but I find the interface easy to use and navigate. It does
| sometimes take a while to acknowledge a click. That's
| annoying but overall I really like Mazda's approach.
| walrus01 wrote:
| > Generally speaking the horrifying quality of Ford's
| electronics have been enough to keep me away from even
| considering purchasing one.
|
| well it certainly is reassuring to know that not much has
| changed at all since my boomer-generation older relatives
| warned me away from ever buying a north american made car,
| instead recommending honda/toyota/mazda/nissan sedans, 30 years
| ago.
|
| what is old is new again.
| ubermonkey wrote:
| >Apple CarPlay and Android Auto are okay-ish, but frankly I
| find the experience of just having the phone on a mount and
| using that as the display to be far superior in almost every
| way.
|
| That's super confusing to me. How is that superior to the
| larger presentation of (e.g.) CarPlay that has (a) bigger touch
| targets and (b) an automatically filtered presentation of apps
| relevant to driving?
|
| I find CarPlay to be so good that I will not consider an
| automobile that lacks it. I've never used the Android
| equivalent, but I just assume it's on par.
| cheschire wrote:
| I think GP finds the tactile buttons more worthwhile than the
| larger screen, and the small phone screen is "good enough"
| for all the rest.
| codazoda wrote:
| This happens in every car I own. Chevy. Kia. Ram.
|
| I agree the phone should do everything. The equivalent of an
| old aux cord (maybe via BT) would be enough.
|
| My Kia does have CarPlay, which is very nice for maps and
| audio, but that's all I really use. It still has all kinds of
| issues. My wife plugs in her phone (cable) and it takes over,
| then suddenly mine wins it back, she flicks some stuff on her
| screen to get it back again. Pretty messy in all cars I've
| used.
| andrewla wrote:
| I currently have a Subaru, which almost gets it right. It
| does switch me over to radio, but if you set it to the Sirius
| "unit id" channel it is at least silent while you fix it, and
| really you press one button (the "media" button that is a
| physical button) and everything works again. Bluetooth is
| spotty, so I mostly use a USB cable.
|
| Ford Sync, on the other hand, once it decides that it is
| trying to connect to bluetooth, will often completely lock up
| the system for minutes while it tries unsuccessfully to make
| things work, and then you have to navigate through their UI
| to get back to a good state, which means that if it decides
| to glitch while you're driving, you're just out of luck. If
| you have a little bit of luck your phone will just play the
| driving directions out of its internal speaker.
| mbesto wrote:
| > Chevy. Kia. Ram.
|
| I'm pretty sure every single one of these just outsource to
| Aptiv (fka Delphi Automotive) for electronics.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aptiv
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| I have had no issues with wired CarPlay. Do you have wireless
| CarPlay? I have not heard of that being reliable yet.
|
| If both of you are wiring into CarPlay, I do not see why Kia
| would allow two wired connections to CarPlay.
| mh- wrote:
| Wireless CarPlay hasn't been reliable in my experience
| either, which is unfortunate. Even if it's not flaky (it
| is), the audio quality of music being played sounds highly
| compressed compared to plugging in.
| andrewla wrote:
| The issue is that the car tries to decide which phone to
| have take over CarPlay. I actually have a cigarette lighter
| USB adapter so at least a second person can charge without
| confusing the poor car.
|
| I generally find CarPlay to be annoying -- it is too
| limiting a version of what is offered on the phone itself.
| Notably the last time I tried to use it, it did not have
| Google Play Music support (now that product is dead, and I
| suppose by now they probably do support Youtube Music), and
| it refused to let me use maps in a "north-up" orientation,
| which is just a non-starter for me.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| If Apple Maps does not let you navigate in north up
| orientation, then another navigation app should be able
| to. It does not seem like that would be a CarPlay
| specific restriction, but rather something the app makers
| did not implement.
|
| And there are a lot more apps that work with CarPlay
| nowadays. I think it just took a few years for all of
| them to roll out.
| andrewla wrote:
| I use Google Maps even with non-CarPlay interaction
| because Apple Maps does not do north-up. At the time,
| Google Maps didn't do north-up in CarPlay mode. Maybe
| it's time I give it another try. Last I tried it, I found
| generally that things worked less good in CarPlay than
| they did on the phone itself, and decided to mostly treat
| the infotainment system as a nice set of speakers for my
| phone.
| bayindirh wrote:
| Then, I invite you to drive a Renault Taliant which has no
| screen and delegates everything to your phone.
|
| Plug it in and fix your phone to the supplied mount, open
| nav.
|
| Your phone is a throttling, OLED dimming, overheating
| fireball from all the processing it has to do with the summer
| sun beaming onto it, broiling and killing it in the process.
|
| I don't recommend this.
|
| The car has a terrific iPod interface built into it though.
| One of the best working ones.
| Mountain_Skies wrote:
| That model probably wouldn't be legal in the US where all
| new vehicles are required to have a video screen for a
| rearview camera. Since they're already required to have the
| screen for that purpose, it ends up being used to eliminate
| other controls.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| It doesn't have to be a touchscreen, nor part of the
| infotainment. The inexpensive compliant solution is a
| rearview mirror with embedded 2 or 3 inch LCD.
| toast0 wrote:
| I've got a 2013 Ford with the much derided Sync 2. Everything
| pretty much works, it's just the UX is really slow, and the
| colors aren't pretty. Also, inputs queue up which is weird with
| a touch screen. It adds up to infotainment being hard to use
| while driving, but the buttons pretty much work, and the radio
| stays off if it was off before turning off the car (if you were
| on Bluetooth before, and your phone isn't present when you
| start up again, it will try for a while and then fail back to
| radio, and if your bluetooth audio level is lower than radio,
| that could be loud... but bluetooth audio levels is a cross car
| issue)
|
| Compared to my 2017 Chrysler which can't really turn off the
| radio, only mute it, which doesn't hold across start cycles,
| and refused to work with my wife's phone for 6 months (probably
| a Nokia Android firmware issue, because it stopped working with
| a phone update and started working again with a phone update,
| but it worked on the Ford the whole time), and the head unit
| has crashed while in motion a handful of times, the Ford isn't
| so bad.
|
| But everything is terrible, and I look forward to a future
| where the phone does most of the work. Although, my (couple of
| years ago) experience with Android Auto is I'd rather use
| Android directly, and not let it know it's in a car.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Anything compared to a Chrysler is not so bad.
| rmatt2000 wrote:
| I used to own a Ford Fusion with an early version of Sync. The
| car itself was great. The Sync software by Microsoft, however,
| was not.
|
| One of the innumerable bugs was in the voice recognition
| system. No matter what song I requested, about half the time it
| played "Tiny Dancer" by Elton John.
|
| I was demonstrating this bug to a friend who asked "What
| happens when you request Tiny Dancer?" Sure enough, it played
| something else.
| NobodyNada wrote:
| I bought a Focus with Sync 1 last year, and it was
| infuriating. The most infuriating part was that every time
| the car starts it defaulted to aux in mode, and there's no
| button on the panel to switch to Bluetooth -- if I wanted to
| listen to music from my phone, it took about 8 or 9 button
| presses to navigate through three levels of nested menus to
| get to the "media source" option. Every time I got in the
| car.
|
| I finally ripped the thing out and replaced it with a cheap
| Chinese CarPlay head unit that I got on clearance because it
| shipped with defective software (there was a firmware update
| available to fix it). I could not be happier with it.
| vmarsy wrote:
| For me, Sync only worked well to make phone calls ("Call
| Joe")
|
| And during a brief period, I also had a windows phone, where
| you could say "Call Cortana". Cortana was registered as a
| fake contact behind the scenes, and all it would do is
| trigger the Cortana assistant through that phone call. You'd
| then tell Cortana what you wanted, and it had much better
| voice recognition and capabilities than Sync, so it did what
| you wanted 99% of the time. It was pretty cool.
|
| Of course it was annoying and a waste of time as you had to
| always make that call first, but I'm glad the engineers on
| Cortana remembered that "all problems in computer science can
| be solved by another level of indirection"!
| bergenty wrote:
| No, CarPlay is king and the best way to interact with it is a
| touchscreen.
| anderspitman wrote:
| Honestly I've been pretty impressed with the software overall.
| I bought a used 2012 F-150 last year. There was something weird
| with the Bluetooth. I was able to update it to run the latest
| version of Sync which resolved the issue (it was a bit annoying
| to find/format a USB drive that worked). What makes this even
| more impressive is the newer software is designed to run on a
| completely different UI with a fancy screen, but they still
| support my older system just fine.
| bearcobra wrote:
| I think Ford is on the right track of having a large touch
| screen with an actual physical dial that just acts as a kind of
| stylus. The ability for the screen to dynamically adapt to
| different use cases is huge, but in an automotive context
| having tactile feedback is also so important. If they could add
| a couple more of the dials that could be used for climate
| controls or radio stations and then some buttons that users
| could set up as shortcuts more people would be happy.
| Animats wrote:
| Does this mean you have to have a Google account to drive a Ford
| vehicle? That's no good.
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