Tesla's Touchscreen Wiper Controls Ruled Illegal In Germany (electrek.co) 420
A user shares a report from Electrek: Tesla's wiper controls through its touchscreen have been ruled illegal in Germany after someone crashed their Model 3 while using them and fought a fine and driving ban through the court system. A Tesla Model 3 driver got into an accident while using the touchscreen to adjust the speed of the automatic windshield wipers. In Model 3 and Model Y vehicles, Tesla didn't install normal windshield wiper settings through a steering wheel stalk. Instead, the automaker is detecting the rain through its Autopilot cameras and automatically adjusting the speed based on the strength of the rainfall. If the driver wants to adjust the speed, they need to do it through the center touchscreen. The driver in Germany was adjusting those settings when he lost control of the vehicle and crashed. A local district court gave him a fine and a one-month driving ban and that's where the problem started for Tesla. He decided to fight the punishment -- bringing the case to the Higher Regional Court (OLG). "It comes as no surprise that enlightened Germans would be the first to rule Tesla's poly engineered cars a road hazard," adds the Slashdot reader. "Touch screen interfaces have no place in cars."
"Touch interface" is a misnomer (Score:5, Insightful)
Because you can NOT operate it on touch alone, you have to look. That's the whole problem with this bullshit.
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Voice command and voice response OK, but massive fines on the MANUFACTURER for anything that takes eyes off the road.
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It's not remotely close to being able to drive itself, so it's a hypothetical question.
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I take trips between Reykjavík and Hvalfirðir roughly every other day, about half an hour drive. From the last roundabout (it doesn't do roundabouts) in Mosó it's a straight shot to Hvalfjarðarvegur, one manual turn to get on the road (I don't have Navigate on Autopilot), and then another straight shot to the gravel road to my destination.
Times I've had to manually intervene during the non-manual sections: zero.
But oh by all means, go
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That's like Russian roulette, they get lucky.
People also sometimes fall asleep whilst driving and survive unscathed, just like with land assist - they got lucky and driving whilst asleep is dangerous, with or without driving assist.
Re:"Touch interface" is a misnomer (Score:4, Insightful)
The current system deals perfectly fine with stationary cars. I have never encountered a situation where it has not appropriately braked for a stationary car ahead of me. I of course watch, but not once has it happened.
The main thing I keep an eye out for when driving is a car parked off the side of the road but which might be jutting into my lane in a way that AP doesn't recognize. Also any general "weirdness" with roads. For example, it generally does great with construction zones (navigating through tight spaces between cones and barriers better than I can), but for example, there's one construction zone that has a white double line jutting into it, and AP really doesn't want to cross white double lines, so it tries to thread a really tight path between the construction cones and the white line - tighter than I'm comfortable with, so I do that on manual.
I also of course have to pay attention for things that it doesn't yet handle, such as traffic circles. But just as one generally sort of "autopilots" their brain when driving manually in areas they're familiar with, the same happens when on autopilot re: the manual sections - you get near the traffic circle, and without thinking, you take it off AP and drive it yourself, then turn it back on.
The main sort of "bugs" one may encounter are generally harmless, such as getting the speed limit wrong in a section or being overly cautious with another vehicle that's merging in or out (I often override the throttle to pass the car once it's gone far enough out of the lane rather than waiting for it to centre in its new lane). There may also be the occasional phantom braking event (false positive threat - for example, interpreting something as jutting into your lane that isn't or whatnot), but I've only had that happen once or twice, and would much rather have a system tuned to prefer false positives rather than false negatives.
There's a number of other AP-related systems attuned for manual driving, such as collision warning, AEB, lane departure warning, lane departure assist, blind spot detection, etc. My favourite for manual driving, which I've felt kick in 2 or 3 times, is obstacle-aware acceleration. This was added in less than a year ago, and basically, if you try to accelerate full throttle into a wall or whatnot, it won't ban you from doing so, but it'll cut the throttle power to give you time to think, "Hey, am I really sure I want to do this?" Important for a car with such high acceleration.
Re:"Touch interface" is a misnomer (Score:5, Interesting)
There is a button on the left stalk to momentarily activate the wipers and display the wiper controls on the screen. So when you enter a sudden downpour, press the button to immediately activate the wipers and then turn them on with the correct speed setting on the screen. Not ideal, but not as bas as you make it sound.
I do agree about the fog lights, they take two taps in very specific locations and when you are entering a fog bank, that's not where you want your eyes to be.
Re:"Touch interface" is a misnomer (Score:4, Informative)
By the way, the court did not really rule the touch controls illegal. Just that you should be very careful when using them and, if you cause an accident, it's your fault and you can be prosecuted for not paying attention to the road.
Re:"Touch interface" is a misnomer (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, the reporting on this is terrible - on both the ruling, and on the vehicles themselves.
For the record:
1) The wipers have an "auto" mode. Regardless of what you may have heard, auto mode works fine 99,9% of the time.
2) You can force the wipers to wipe with the button on the end of the left stalk. A tap causes a wipe. Holding causes multiple wipes and fluid.
3) I live in a very wet climate. I've had to force a wipe maybe 10 times total. Usually while stopped before I've started driving.
4) When you force a wipe, a wiper menu comes up on the lower left of the screen, within "edge distance" of your fingers (so your fingers have the edge / corner as a physical guideline), with large buttons, allowing you to change wiper settings off of auto if you wish.
5) I've taken the car off auto precisely once. I know people who've owned their cars for years and never taken it off auto.
6) You don't have to use the (edge/corner guided, large-buttoned, near-your-field-of-view) menu to change wiper settings; you can also use voice commands. "Set wipers to..." (auto, 1, 2, 3, 4, max, on, off) are all valid commands.
7) Even if this wasn't the case, the car has Autopilot; the odds of getting in an accident on Autopilot during the brief time you might be looking away are vanishingly small.
It's entirely a non-issue. On one hand, you have people with little to no experience actually driving Teslas insisting that it must be some sort of issue, and on the other hand, you have the vast majority of people who actually own them and drive them overwhelmingly telling you it really isn't. Yet for some reason people listen to the former.
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Re, the touchscreen in general: first off, you really don't interact with much at all when driving. The vast majority of what you do is on the steering wheel buttons and stalks, and so many features are automated, so you don't really have to think about them. And almost everything has voice commands associated with it, too.
Secondly, the most commonly used buttons are A) huge (about 1" / 2,5cm on each side), so they don't require any alignment precision, B) right in your peripheral, immediately next to the
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Judging by the number of complaints on forums like Tesla Motors Club there are plenty of people who whom it doesn't work very well.
Anyway, if it was so great then why was this guy messing around it with?
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Because you can NOT operate it on touch alone, you have to look. That's the whole problem with this bullshit.
I too miss buttons on phones. The ability to text while driving without taking my eyes OR hands off the wheel was amazing, takes all of a weak to memorize the keys.
Re:"Touch interface" is a misnomer (Score:4, Funny)
A weak what?
Re:"Touch interface" is a misnomer (Score:5, Informative)
The lack of tactile controls and the reliability of their cars are the two main reasons I haven't bought a Tesla. I could never buy a car where everything is controlled through a touch screen. I am not really a fan of the voice controls either; I have better things to memorize than all the commands for a car and then still have to repeat myself several times. I want to be able to reach for buttons and knobs without having to take my eyes off the road.
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In the music / audio world (and many other tech. sectors) we often use "control surfaces" - they're often laid out like good old analog mixers and controllers but they just send digital commands to running mixer/controller software. Sounds like someone could make various tactile controls, like the normal wiper controls, and figure out how to interface them to the Tesla's software.
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My GPS has voice control but I can never get it to activate when I want it to. The radio, however. There's at least a dozen songs that can (but far from always!) activate it, meaning I suddenly have to focus on getting the voice control to accept the CANCEL command so I get my minimap back.
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The driver couldn't see out of the window but instead of pulling over he tried to keep on driving while fiddling with controls that he hadn't bothered to learn before setting off.
In the first place, you can't always pull over in that kind of situation. Sometimes it's unsafe, sometimes it's impossible. I won't name examples - if you can't think of your own please go immediately to the nearest DMV location and surrender your licence. DON'T drive there yourself.
The problem wasn't the touch screen, the number of Teslas sold already proves that. The problem was somewhere between the touch screen and the seat.
No. Relying on voice activation for that kind of safety-critical function is retarded. What if I lose my voice, or have a coughing fit? What if the voice recognition simply 'plays deaf' for a moment? (No, that's NEVER happened t
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The absolute golden rule of driving is that you should be able to stop in the distance that you see to be clear ahead. If the windscreen is so badly obscured then you need to be slowing right down and potentially coming to a stop. If you can't get off the side of the road then apply your hazard lights.
There are absolutely no exceptions to this. This driver *FAILED* to stick to this rule, and as such the fault lay between the seat and the touch screen.
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The absolute golden rule of driving is that you should be able to stop in the distance that you see to be clear ahead. If the windscreen is so badly obscured then you need to be slowing right down and potentially coming to a stop. If you can't get off the side of the road then apply your hazard lights.
Agreed. However, if your windscreen is so badly obscured only because you can't quickly and reliably set the speed of your wipers, then slowing down in front of drivers who are likely going faster because their wipers are working as expected, is dangerous. I still consider it to be a design fail on Tesla's part.
There are absolutely no exceptions to this. This driver *FAILED* to stick to this rule, and as such the fault lay between the seat and the touch screen.
The farthest I'll move in your direction on this is shared negligence. Yes, the driver should have done things differently. But would the accident have occurred with a traditional wiper control mecha
Re:"Touch interface" is a misnomer (Score:5, Informative)
Yep. The touch screen is a terrible interface in an automobile. I know, I've got one. When I need to do something that doesn't involve controls on the steering wheel, I'll usually pull over. Tesla takes this bad interface to new heights by trying to put as much as possible on there. Even the touch part is a problem because the car is moving and no matter how good your suspension is there's going to be some amount of bouncing.
Re: "Touch interface" is a misnomer (Score:3)
I wouldn't be surprised if the touch screen interface will be banned or legalized to be disabled while driving the car.
Push buttons and to some extent freewheels also suffer from the same issue - you need to look when you operate them. Tactile feedback is important.
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I wouldn't be surprised if the touch screen interface will be banned or legalized to be disabled while driving the car.
My Mazda's infotainment system does that--if the car is moving, the touch-screen is disabled. However, you can still control it with a knob. Press the knob and it will activate. Turn the knob to select a different control. Press the knob again and it will act like you hit the control. It's kind of like using the tab key to move around to different controls.
Which means you still have to stare at the screen while you're doing this to see what on-screen button is selected. Pretty useless and I probably s
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Though in this case I suspect that the Tesla engineer figured that the "smart" window wipers would be good enough under all circumstances, and that you'd never have to fiddle with it while driving. If they consider it a setting rather than a control, the touch screen is the right place for it. These automatic wipers have gotten pretty good over the years, so I can
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Interestingly, the smart wipers, at least on my Model X are marked "beta" so I suspect that you may be wrong in thinking the engineers think they are good. They are awful actually and I have mine disabled but at least I get a stick with the wiper controls on the model X.
The left stalk also controls the wipers (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:The left stalk also controls the wipers (Score:4, Informative)
The stalk only lets you do a momentary wipe or turn the wipers on/off. It doesn't let you adjust the speed or sensitivity, and that's what this guy was mucking about with. In fact the car prompts you to fiddle with the screen by popping the controls up as soon as you move the stalk.
The voice control is the usual janky and slow to respond affair.
Re:"Touch interface" is a misnomer (Score:5, Insightful)
Yup. I remember being at King of Prussia Mall during the 2014 series of noreasters and seeing a Tesla store, and stopping in. I sat down inside, was kinda only moderately impressed with the generically GM/Toyota crowd pleaser interior dominating by a slightly-too-bright for effectively "sitting still in a tunnel" mall lighting. Conversation went something like this:
"Wait...where's headlight control?" "They're automatic based on whether the car's on, whether or not it's in drive, and whether or not the parking brake is on." "Oh, nice, kinda like a Hyundai if you just leave the headlights in the ON position all the time." "Yeah, pretty much." "Wait...whoa, wait, where's the defogger and wiper controls?" "Oh, they're here..." The salesman then proceeds to go three levels deep in submenus. "Wow, that's really, really dangerous! Those are pretty basic controls you need immediately when you need them!" "Well, they're still right here when you need them..." "Have you driven before? Like, at all? How much does one of these go for?" "Yeah, you can move that decimal point two places to the left and you're still charging too much. I can go to the junkyard for a weird car I have to jump through hoops to get basic shit to work for about $500."
Whoever designed these things are trying to make a car for people that really should be on a bus or hiring a car service instead, and it's not a concept that works.
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Touch interface, meaning that you touch it to interface with it. As opposed to a twist interface, a push interface, a knob interface, a slider interface, or any other physical manipulation of a control device.
I would posit that the different physical controls on different cars can be just as confusing and distracting unless the driver knows them by heart from repetition and frequent use.
Anecdotal case in point: After taking my eight-year-old vehicle in for service, the headlights were changed from Auto to O
Just cause you can doesn't mean you should (Score:5, Informative)
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Good. I can't even stand touchscreens on remote controls. I want to look at the TV, not the remote, when I change a channel. Can't imagine having to look at a control in a car for an essential feature when I need to look at the road.
I know, right? I have take my eyes off the road to physically turn around threaten my children when they're acting up in the back seat... I don't know why the folks at Tesla couldn't have installed a steering wheel button command to relieve me of this distraction.
And don't get me started on that damned Samsung phone.
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Ha, I downloaded the Roku app once and my god what a terrible interface. Turn on the phone, unlock the phone, cancel the "please enter your Apple ID so we can monetize you" pop-up, then use some buttons on the app while looking directly at the phone and not at what's on the screen. That is already far too long for "pause", but maybe ok for some other stuff. But then you put the phone down, and 30 seconds later you want another control; and you have to start over again because the phone has locked itself.
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Well, the issue wasn't that the wipers weren't on, it's that they were going too fast/not fast enough.
I agree--I shouldn't have to go through the touchscreen to adjust something like that. But it sounds more like these vaunted automatic wipers weren't doing their job correctly.
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Tesla's Touchscreen Wiper Controls Ruled Illegal In Germany
https://www.tesla.com/support/... [tesla.com]
"Turn on windshield wipers/increase wiper speed"
Re:Just cause you can doesn't mean you should (Score:5, Funny)
"Increasing home thermostat and calling your mom."
Trolling Achievement Unlocked! (Score:5, Insightful)
You see trolls in the comments every story, and trolls in the submission text at least weekly, but trolling in the submitter name; that might be a first.
Re:Trolling Achievement Unlocked! (Score:4, Funny)
To be fair, you really couldn't expect Bezos would comment here about Elon using his given name.
Re:Trolling Achievement Unlocked! (Score:5, Insightful)
"trolling in the submitter name; that might be a first"
Yeah, really not acceptable, I'm amazed slashdot is promoting such an attack on a regular slashdot user.
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Grow up, you're not in elementary school anymore.
Re:Trolling Achievement Unlocked! (Score:5, Funny)
". "Trump attacks TikTok over privacy fears" doesn't mean he's invaded China. "
To be fair, with Trump, you would have to read the article to be sure.
Re:Trolling Achievement Unlocked! (Score:4)
It's always "Tesla could do this..." but for some reason they never do until forced to by a court or a regulation, usually because one of their customers crashed due to the mis-feature.
Autopilot has reduced functionality in Europe too because of this, as does Summon. The worst part is that they have been selling "Full Self Driving" in Europe since 2016. It won't be finished for years yet and when it is it will be years more before it's actually legal to use it here, at which point most of the people who bought it will have sold their cars and many of the cars will be on the scrap heap.
This is not ethical behaviour. This is "what can we get away with?"
Re:Trolling Achievement Unlocked! (Score:4)
"On the wiper issue. If there really is an issue there (which I doubt) Tesla could fix it with a fairly easy software update. For example the button at the end of the turn signal stalk can modified so that if it is pressed multiple times it will step through wiper states. Once: one wipe. (as it is now) Twice: wipers on slow. Three times: fast. Then if they are running then one press to turn them off. Something like that."
Or they could have done the same as they do on the S and X i.e. you can set the wiper speed by rotating the end of the turn signal. Much like most cars. It does strike me as a dogmatic approach to move this to the touchscreen rather than a sensible approach.
Putting unusable controls in cars is Brave (Score:4, Insightful)
No They Weren't (Score:5, Informative)
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The voice commands were unavailable at the time ... and he minimally crashed his car.
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I had a car with an early touchscreen system that could be used for navigation, climate control and entertainment and some other things, although there were manual and voice controls for most of the features as well...
The navigation system wouldn't let you interact with it via the touchscreen while the car was moving, which is sensible enough in most cases. But the touchscreen was located in the centre console, where it was reached just as easily by the passenger as well as the driver. There's no reason the
Was the car bought in Germany? (Score:2)
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It's not as if a wheel fell off. The guy did something stupid.
Should cars not have a glove box because a driver might rummage through it while negotiating an icy curve?
Display screens are being used for far too many functions, it's a really stupid design choice. Nonetheless, that doesn't remove responsibility from the driver.
Re: Was the car bought in Germany? (Score:3, Informative)
The guy did something stupid
No. The guy was trying to safely operate the vehicle by changing the wiper speed because automatic wipers never set it appropriately.
Tesla provided a dangerous interface to a basic and required vehicle control. Touch screens are dangerous because you need to look at them and not the road.
It's not like he was fiddling with the radio.
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Ford sold me a car with a touchscreen radio. Doesn't mean it's legal to operate while I'm driving. It's also got bluetooth, doesn't mean it's legal for me to talk on the phone. It's also got a satnav, doesn't mean it's legal for me to be tapping it.
Technically, adjusting a radio or changing a tape is already in the bounds of prosecutions having occurred.
If anything, the guy's only recourse would be for Tesla to compensate him and fix the car so it's not necessary.
I don't think you'll find a single thing
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Indeed radios are generally intended to be operated by a passenger while the car is moving, which is why they are located centrally instead of being on the driver's side where all the controls required for actually driving are.
Manual wipers? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Manual wipers? (Score:5, Informative)
What about snow? (Score:2)
The Tesla also does rain sensing.
The problem with these automatic rain-sensing systems is that my experience is they utterly fail the moment you have snow and they cannot account well for individual preferences in how clear you want the window. They are the car equivalent of automatic lights for rooms that use motion, IR and light sensors to try guess when you want the lights on or not.
The great thing with manual switches is that they mean that the system is set to what you want. Until they develop a mind-reading sensor, automatic syst
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Re:Manual wipers? (Score:4, Informative)
Granted, the Mercedes I'm used to driving is a 2013 model, but "rain sensing" is the first click off "no wipers". Beyond that you have at least three settings for forced wiping, using a manually operated switch on one of the wheel stalks. Better than "use the touchscreen or you can't". Same with the 2009 Lexus I used to have.
Same with my 9 year old BMW. Auto wipers are a button on the stalk, auto wiper sensitivity is a knob on the stalk. If you want manual wipers you can move the stalk for that too. No need for any controls anywhere but the stalk.
The touch screen is one of the things that really turns me off Tesla. Cars should have tactile controls for everything you might need to operate while driving.
If you design your controls so a blind person could operate them, you have done a good job.
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It is these last two manual settings which are missing from the Tesla 3 control stalk [youtu.be]. The only manual control you have of the
Safety first (Score:4, Insightful)
Windscreen wipers are a safety feature. You don't put touchscreen controls on a safety feature!
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Re:Safety first (Score:4, Informative)
You don't understand Elon. It would de-cool the car if you had real buttons.
Like the real button that controls the wipers on the left stalk?
Drivers have one job, operate the vehicle safely (Score:2)
Anything that mentally distracts should be turned off or put away until the driver can stop.
If you can't do that then call a taxi, use Uber, car pool, use public transportation or WALK.
DRIVERS HAVE ONE JOB.
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DRIVERS HAVE ONE JOB.
To carry my Amazon Prime packages up the walk?
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Agreed. The mentally distracting thing here was the touchscreen.
Tesla should put wiper controls on the stalk. Poor design. Like their reliance on vision over LIDAR and their missing inward facing cameras
Computer plus (Score:3)
Tesla didn't install normal windshield wiper settings through a steering wheel stalk. Instead, the automaker is detecting the rain through its Autopilot cameras and automatically adjusting the speed based on the strength of the rainfall. If the driver wants to adjust the speed, they need to do it through the center touchscreen
Hey, Tesla! Here's a 25 year old book.
Car + computer = computer [amazon.com]
Ironically, it was already an example back then.
"Enlightened" anti-competitive Germans? (Score:2)
The only "Enlightening" thing I can think about Germany in this case is how many car companies there are in that country that are competitors to Tesla.
I wouldn't be surprised if BMW or Volkswagen AG bankrolled this lawsuit, knowing that it will likely prevent Tesla from selling cars there for a few months while Tesla engineers develop a custom one-off solution that meets German regulator approval.
The German electric carmakers from the likes of Audi, Porsche, and BMW are struggling to keep up with Tesla, and
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German carmakers know a bit about good automotive UIs.
If you really have to pull over to set the auto wiper speed they are totally right to mock Tesla for it.
No, they're not illegal (Score:2)
You can't do it while driving, just as you can't feed 20 CDs to your perfectly legal Player while driving.
Next up, radio and environmental controls (Score:4, Insightful)
Whoever thought it would be a good idea to replace physical knobs/dials which can be readily felt and manipulated with ease with a flat, non-feedback screen should never be allowed to design anything ever again.
It's not cheaper because when the screen goes, or a particular part of the screen goes, the entire thing has to be replaced. Whereas if a knob/dial happens to go bad (when was the last time you had one go bad on you?) you replace only that one particular part.
Knob and dials are like light switches. Instantaneous control and they last forever. Screens, not so much, not to mention the environmental cost of manufacturing a screen then disposing of it.
Re:Next up, radio and environmental controls (Score:4, Funny)
The volume up and cruise resume keys on my steering wheel have both failed and the dealer wants $500 to replace them. It's unlikely the touchscreen will fail.
I wish I could do those things with voice like in a Tesla.
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Adjusting the wipers while driving is sometimes necessary to, you know, see the road.
Isn't Autopilot supposed to prevent crashes? (Score:2)
So Tesla's Autopilot feature has time to argue with the driver about the wiper speed but not to prevent a crash?
screens extremely dangerous (Score:4, Interesting)
i have blue eyes, and am short-sighted. i'm also light-sensitive. to illustrate; night-time driving for me has become a complete nightmare since the introduction of point-focussed (3in wide) XEON headlights rather than the much larger 5-7in spread beam lights. i actually have to hold up one hand to shield against the glare of oncoming headlights (that's XEON headlights *without* being on high-beam).
touchscreens *inside* a car are, for me, extremely dangerous. the additional light glare inside the vehicle causes a massive reduction in visibility out of the windshield, *and* sets up corner-reflections in my glasses which makes visibility even worse (light reflects back and forth *inside* your glasses: it's why you have a 90nm coating to stop reflections, but it's not perfect).
i drove a friend's Tesla once at night, and even the "night" setting of the centre console touchscreen was so bright i had extreme difficulty navigating the mountainous country roads (no streetlamps).
i also found driving the Tesla to be extremely dangerous due to a 1/3 second delay in the throttle response. a "normal" car will respond immediately when the pedal is pressed. that extra 1/3 second delay, when stationary, could mean the difference between getting out of the way of another driver and getting hit.
overall i am deeply unimpressed, and am frankly amazed that people "rave" about these vehicles.
amusing story: when living in scotland, driving a 35-year-old Landrover Defender 90, being literally in the middle of nowhere and having a 9 mile journey along winding roads across moors with no houses, people or traffic, on a star-lit night i would switch off the headlamps *entirely* and drive *safely*. the reason for switching off the lights: the moors are so dark that even the interior dashboard lights were enough to be such contrast that it was not possible to distinguish things.
contrary to all "common sense" expectation, only by switching off *all* lights - interior and exterior - and allowing the "rods" in my eyes time to adjust to proper "night vision" could i properly make out the road, and drive safely. if you would like an informative and entertaining thing to watch about this, look up the Mythbusters "Pirates eye-patch night vision" myth (episode 71) https://mythresults.com/episod... [mythresults.com]
Re:screens extremely dangerous (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: screens extremely dangerous (Score:3)
It sounds like you shouldn't qualify for a drivers license
Someone had to say it. Dangerous drivers using any justification to keep driving dangerously.
What (s)he doesn't realise is that with the lights off I can't see him down the road until I'm basically on top of him.
Ill bet he also drives about 40 below the posted limit in those conditions. You already see them driving that way on the highway in perfect conditions in the middle of the day.
If I come around a bend, or pull out into the road and happen upon his invisible ass with a delta-V that high it's not goin
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Driving on the empty moors: Ships don't have headlights--you pilot them using whatever ambient light there is at night, and pay attention to the lights on other ships. And you come on watch early, so your eyes can get accustomed to the (lack of light); when you need to consult a chart, you use a red lens flashlight, to avoid harming your night vision.
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What part of 'empty Moors" sounds like "motor highway"? Ships don't whiz along at an average of 100KM, taking turns and curves as they come.
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I believe you mean Xenon [HID] headlights. They are wicked bright. I have cheap LEDs, they're pretty bright too. But I got some that have proper focus, so the light is at least going to the right place.
You need a 90s Saab, they have a "night mode" switch that dims all the lights to the bare minimum.
Re:screens extremely dangerous (Score:4, Informative)
i also found driving the Tesla to be extremely dangerous due to a 1/3 second delay in the throttle response. a "normal" car will respond immediately when the pedal is pressed. that extra 1/3 second delay, when stationary, could mean the difference between getting out of the way of another driver and getting hit.
Are you sure you don't have it on chill mode? I measure around 120 milliseconds with my 60fps camera testing. It feels pretty snappy to me, and I tend to hate latency in all its forms.
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Seriously, if you have such "eye problems", you simply should not drive.
And yes, I have super light sensitive eyes, too.
The wipers are controlled on the left stalk.... (Score:5, Informative)
Re: The wipers are controlled on the left stalk... (Score:2)
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The on/off switch is on the left stalk, not the speed control.
https://www.howtotesla.com/how... [howtotesla.com]
"Touch screen interfaces have no place in cars." (Score:2)
I have to agree. All controls that the driver has to operate must be physical controls with a distinctive feel. Any controls I need as a driver I should be able to find with my eyes still on the road.
My most recent truck, bought used but new to me, has a touch screen for a variety of things that I probably shouldn't be doing while driving. But it has voice commands for any controls I'm likely to need, and the button to initiate a command is on a known place on the steering wheel.
So I punch the voice cont
Eyes on the road (Score:2)
I play music via my iPhone that's mounted to my dash. I've been actively looking for solutions to this because changing songs on it completely takes my attention from the road. The lack of tactile buttons forces you to focus on the screen to perform your actions. Tesla's dash takes this to the nth degree and is completely dangerous.
What do people see in Tesla? (Score:4, Insightful)
Tesla cars are painfully plain and boring (ugly) in appearance at least models normal people are willing to pay for.
They constantly spy on everything you do.
Placement of the stupid big screen tablet absence of physical buttons is itself a deal breaker.
Ongoing maintenance costs are not competitive with ICE despite complexity advantage.
Why do companies have to be so obnoxious? Why can't they just produce vehicles that work without loading them with bullshit misfeatures? Elon's goal IIRC was to get the world off of ICE.... so why doesn't he make a product that appeals to a wider audience?
Slashdot getting it wrong (Score:5, Insightful)
The ruling did NOT declare Tesla's wiper controls illegal. It declared it illegal to configure (!) the automatic wiper's settings using the touch screen controls when it's distracting you from driving. The driver got a sentencing for being an asshole and not keep his f*ing eyes on the road in a critical situation! (Proven, as he caused an accident.)
There are at least three ways (!) I can come up with immediately that would have achieved the same without causing an accident because you're an idiot and let yourself be distracted: :-)
1. Use the physical controls and just set the wiper to continuous/max. Accept that it makes you feel uneasy
2. Use voice control!
3. Stop the car and play with your touch screen.
Also applies to my BMW's interface: I cannot configure (enable/disable) the AC while driving, as this would mean to push "Menu AC" button, scroll down a little bit, touch "Enable AC". I'd have to try and see if the voice interface can do it (never tried, always set to on), try / trust lane keep assist, or stop the car.
The driver held the false belief that just because it's somehow related to driving, configuring the wiper in a sub(-sub) menu was legal at all times. It's not.
Re:Get Musk off (Score:5, Insightful)
So what if they put the wiper controls in the trunk? The driver is always responsible for operating the vehicle safely.
Ach, bullshit. Heavy machinery needs to be designed well. I own a Model 3, and generally love it, but the insistence on touch screen stuff you fiddle with often, utterly suuuucks. I can't change the temperature of the car without hitting & dragging a little spot on a glass touch screen and then watching what temperature number it changes to. It's stupid.
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
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Just because it's the best designed EV so far, doesn't mean there isn't room for improvement.
There are several things about the Model 3 (and Model Y) that are kind of head-scratchers. Like the controls to open the damn door from the inside. When you have to explain to every passenger how to get out of the car, it's not a good design for a fucking door.
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I has, though tbh I haven't played with it yet as I haven't learned any of the voice commands, and I haven't heard that it's particularly good. Have never thought far enough ahead (ie before driving) to look it up. I should investigate that...
It would be fine if there were just a few physical controls, it wouldn't take many. They went too far with the minimalism.
Re: (Score:2)
It actually is quite good in comparison to the absolutely shitty ones I've used in the past from European car makers.
In fact, just popped out to the garage and used it to say "wipers on" and it turned them on at speed 2/4. "Wipers max" puts them to full speed. "Wipers auto" returns them to automatic.
So it turns out that you can adjust the speed just fine without the touchscreen.
Re:Get Musk off (Score:5, Interesting)
I am currently driving a 20-year-old car with heating/cooling controls that I can manipulate without looking at them. Same with the wipers, the aftermarket radio (unless pairing a new Bluetooth device), the lights, in fact almost everything. Everything is a physical button and I know most of them well enough not to have to spare even a second looking at them.
Wiper Controls Essential (Score:4, Insightful)
So what if they put the wiper controls in the trunk? The driver is always responsible for operating the vehicle safely.
If you were talking about the controls for the radio I would agree but you need to use the wiper controls to operate the vehicle safely. For example, if a lorry overtakes you and splashes a load of muddy water on your windscreen you need to be able to operate the wipers quickly and if that means you have to fiddle around with a touch screen controller it's not safe.
Re:Wiper Controls Essential (Score:4, Informative)
There's a button on the end of the turn signal (left) stalk for that.
Re: Wiper Controls Essential (Score:3, Funny)
In 2020, we have decided to let the car decide whether the driver is able to see, instead of, you know, the driver looking out the front window. Expecting the driver to ensure that they can see where they are going is so old fashioned. /S
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Same thing as putting rear view mirrors there. Certain aspects of the vehicle are mandated by the law, and while corporations can always dick consumers with their superior negotiating power, large nation state can do the exact same thing to corporations.
And in this case, consumer was smart enough to get nation state apparatus involved. "Hi Goliath, I'm David, meet my best friend God".
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There'd be less room for the dead hooker.
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I've heard of people crashing and killing people while putting a tape in their tape-deck, back in the 80's/90's. Was a big headline. Some nurse, fumbled the tape, looked down, crashed head on, killed people. All for a tape of music that, though perfectly legal to have in the car, should not be operated while the car is being driven.
You can argue all you like, but most countries have the same rule, and often specific rules against touch-screen devices (aimed at phones/satnavs, but applies equally to the T
Re: (Score:3)
I'm guess a lot of comments here suggesting you have to use the screen haven't actually driven a Tesla.
The wiper control is the button on the end of the left stalk. Press it and the wipers start and the other more detailed controls pop up on the screen so you can mess with the setting if that's convenient - one finger tap on the screen. Otherwise press the button on the right of the steering wheel and talk to it to set the wipers to do whatever you want them to do.
Can you control the speed from the left stalk?
The answer to this question is HELL NO.
Which begs the question what comments exactly are you objecting to? The ability to simply turn wipers on and off is NOT the issue and amounts to little more than a straw man.