Linux-Powered Auto-Parking Car

megmag writes "A really cool project using a Linux P4 machine for automatic parking of a Volvo S60 was presented last week. Take a look at the video. That's how your parking problem should be solved. It is a final-year student project within the mechanical engineering department at Linköping University, Sweden."

Comments

This is cool

[AviLazar]

For the inept :) Then again I know a few women (no offense) who could really use this. Especially suburbanites :)

Re:This is cool

[robertjw]

Personally I feel that any person that can't manage to park their car shouldn't be allowed to drive it at all.

Of course I also think that at least 80% of the people on the road are scarier than hell and shouldn't be allowed to drive. Don't believe me? Turn on your local news for the first snow storm of the season (if you don't get snow, find the Denver newscast - it's always humorus). I'm always amazed at the way people who live in an area that gets bad weather EVERY YEAR will wreck their car the first time there is three inches of snow. Maybe if we actually taught people how to drive there would be less traffic fatalities in this country - actually, probably not, Everybody knows that traffic accidents are caused by people not wearing their seat belt.

Re:This is cool

[Paulrothrock]

There was a show on the Discovery channel a while back about the differences between men and women. They were given the task of parking a car (VW New Beetle) in a space 1 foot longer than the length of the car. All of the men who tried could do it. Only 70% of the women could get it in. While not a definitive study, it does provide some non-anecdotal evidence that this is the case.

To be fair, in the same show they did an experiment where men and women were given a list of things to do in a time limit. Things like answering the door, the phone, cooking, cleaning, writing out a grocery list, and other basic household stuff. All but one of the men failed to finish in the time period, and experienced significantly more stress in accomplishing these tasks. They also tended to do one thing at a time and got flustered when their concentration was broken. All of the women had no trouble finishing the same tasks from the same list in the same environment.

Re:This is cool

[Paulrothrock]

Same show, different experiment.

Men and women were asked to draw a bike from memory. Women always had all the right parts, but rarely in the right places. Men rarely had all the parts, but always in the right places. There is a difference in how men and women's minds work. It's not that one is better or worse than the other, it's that they're different.

Re:This is cool

[jswhiting]

There are exhibitable differences in how men and women think and behave, no doubt, but who can show that these differences are not the result of a lifetime of training in a complex social environment under intense pressures?

Maybe you could do an experiment to show that men "have a higher capacity for algebra", or "have a higher capacity for mechanical engineering," by doing some basic tests. However, in our society, women are encouraged NOT to understand algebra and engineering. Why? Because a woman who does is unattractive!! Think about the stereotypes and the status quo here - imagine what the general student opinion would be of a girl in high school who took and aced advanced calculus? Do you think the guys would be "all over her"? What would her friends think? In the greater scheme of the social environment, we enforce gender difference in a very complex interlocking web of pressures.

It seems it has but one flaw

[foidulus]

whenever it parks behind Darl McBride's car, it keeps on slamming the gas and ramming into it...I wonder why

Re:It seems it has but one flaw

[ideatrack]

You're failing to see the potential in making a joke about Darl McBride being rammed from behind repeatedly, with a huge metal object.

what the?

[FatAlb3rt]

cool, but i really could've done without the shirtless guy. wtf?

Re:what the?

[Patrik_AKA_RedX]

Another fine example why we need more women in engineering.

Re:what the?

[PetoskeyGuy]

There is another video without the guy. http://www.ikp.liu.se/evolve/2004/filmer/Park_auto .wmv

uhhhhh

[Choachy]

He can program a car to park itself, but he cant put on a shirt?

that space would almost fit two cars

[funkdancer]

video is cool, but now try doing it in a real world situation where you've got 60% of that space...

I was surprised to be able to download the vid at full speed, though. :)

Re:that space would almost fit two cars

[mirko]

When I was in Germany, they'd fine you if you 'd let less than a meter between your park and the next so it might be the worst still legal situation in Sweden too.

Re:that space would almost fit two cars

[dcsmith]

Hell, even I could park in that spot. They did a good job, but until they can park in a spot 8 inches longer than your car like in NYC, it doesn't have so much practical purpose.

Hell, I can carry a disk between computers faster than that 300 baud modem. If it can't transmit data any faster than that, it doesn't have much practical purpose. What's that? It'll get faster once people start using it and the technology improves? Huh. Who'd a thunk it?

Sheesh, people, lighten up. Proof of concept.

Re:that space would almost fit two cars

[vrt3]

Not in Belgium. Check http://www.wegcode.be/wegcode/art25.htm (if you understand Dutch...):

Art. 25: parkeerverbod

* 25.1. Het is verboden een voertuig te parkeren:

1. op minder dan 1 meter zowel voor als achter een ander stilstaand of geparkeerd voertuig en op elke plaats waar het voertuig het instappen in of het wegrijden van een ander voertuig zou verhinderen;

Babelfish translation:

Art. 25: parkeerverbod

* 25.1. It has been prohibited park a vehicle:

1. parked on less than 1 meter both for and behind a another one stationary or vehicle and at each place where the vehicle getting in in or driving away a another vehicle would prevent;

Hm, I think I can bo better than the fish...

Art. 25: parking prohibition

* 25.1. It is prohibited to park a vehicle:

1. at less than 1 meter both before and behind another stationary or parked vehicle and at each place where the vehicle would prevent getting in or driving away another vehicle;

Suspicious

[PhysicsGenius]

The article notes that it uses ultrasound sensors to detect the curb and other cars, but I see there are a number of equally spaced white lines painted on the ground (farther out than parking lines are normally painted). How artificial was this test? Can it do arbitrary parallel parking?

Re:Suspicious

[dizdar]

that is because the parking lot that it is in is a normal parking lot. hence the lines pointing the wrong way.

Why they used Linux...

[EvilTwinSkippy]

It crashed less than windows.

Re:Why they used Linux...

[eraserewind]

yeah, but having to type:

driver@volvo> park --parallel --time +5 --left

befrore getting out of the car gets to be a drag.

Re:Why they used Linux...

[EvilTwinSkippy]

Sure beats: I see that you have activated that Automatic Parking System. Would you like to:

• Locate the nearest farmer's market?
• Park your car in the spot selected?
• Drive up a tree?
• Block in the guy who is trying to pull out of the spot you want?

Re:Why they used Linux...

[Ilgaz]

No, first

modprobe volvo.o
chmod /dev/volvo 666
etc etc etc

Linux-powered car

[amliebsch]

Gee, mine's still powered my gasoline.

Funny, but if you look at the lines on the ground

[rsidd]

it looks like cars are supposed to park perpendicular to the edge there, not parallel. But both existing cars were also marked parallel.

mirror

[Chalex]

Here's a mirror of the 3.84MB video.

Nah, that's M$ parking, HERE'S linux parking

[potus98]

Check out this high-speed parking manuever!

[obligatory /. MS bash complete]

Yeah I tried this once

[Stevyn]

I tried this with my laptop running gentoo once. It worked pretty well until I hit a wifi hotspot and it found 3 updates and started compiling for 8 hours.

Would the results have been different I wonder

[Timesprout]

If a team of women had written the software ? hmmmm

Yep - good call..

[oz_ko]

Write an article about linux parking your car - post the video in WMV format...

And while they're at it...

[Last_Available_Usern]

...can they also add a subroutine that will automatically slow down your car when you pass an accident?

Parking meters

[GillBates0]

$699.00 per minute.
Only 25c, 10c and 5c coins accepted.
Meters enforced 24 hours.
Violators will be towed courtesy McBride Breakdown Services.

More information

[Creamsickle]

One of the students on the project is actually the kid of an old friend of mine. In case you're wondering, the Linux system they are using is a custom system based on the Gentoo-HA (High Availability) distribution. In addition to parking cars, the optimized P4 box is also allegedly used for many games of Quake. :)

Also, according to my friend, large quantities of pizza were consumed as an essential part of this project.

Interesting, but dangerous

[grunt107]

Self-driving vehicles (destination by traveler, drive by vehicle) are interesting, but the more removed people get from the driving responsibilities, the worse they actually drive - inattention AND inability both are rising. With the 'self-park', people will now lose another driving skill. That important? Not really - I have rarely PP'd (parallel-parked) - but I believe PPing gives important spatial vehicular training that helps in other driving areas.

Toyota

[pyreblade]

This is exciting and all, but the Japanese version of the Toyota Prius already does this.

Re:Toyota

[iggy3]

cool inventions 2003: Parking Space Invaders

Re:Toyota

[gearry]

If you RTFA, and then read this, you will see that what the two cars do is quite different. The Prius requires quite a bit of user interaction, whereas the system engineered with Volvo appears to require very little driver interaction, as well as the flexibility to be applied in vehicles with different steering systems.

Practical application

[Mordaximus]

If you can't parallel park, you shouldn't be licensed to drive.

But I can see a practical application of this device : Device determins if driver is an incompetent moron who should never have been issued a license, and if that is the case, automatically pull over, park and cut power to the engine.

Imagine the look on the asshole tailgater's face when upon pulling up within inches of your bumper, is denied control of his car, and pulls over to the side of the road (perfectly parked of course.)

Or the moron who is in such a rush that he thinks red lights are optional.

Or my personal pet peeve, the idiots who think signals are optional, and that everyone should just guess what their next move will be...

yup, I think I'd enjoy having the road to myself :)

Questions...

[Whispers_in_the_dark]

1) Who gets the bill when the system screws up and slams the nice $200K car instead of parking neatly next to it?

2) How does the system deal with engine/linkage issues. Cars don't provide smooth power/steering at all times. If the engine is out of tune or has a catchy throttle, can the system deal with that as well as/better than a human?

3) How is it told where to park? It would have been nice if it was clear in the video what the driver did to tell it that. The article alludes to some sort of analysis system for this, but I like pretty pictures. ;)

Pretty nifty anyway!

Future Car concepts

[Colourspace]

I see a lot of people scoffing here but were on the brink of the next revolution in personal transport here and nobody seems to be taking notice. Just how long will it be before cars are wirelessly networked together, an onboard PC on each vehicle doing black-box, GPS navigation, localised proximity sensing and collision avoidance, parking, MP3 and entertainment etc - All of which we have the technology for now (but have not quite driven the cost out of yet) When these vehicles are networked via a mesh system to a basestation this could be used to the greater good for traffic networking (ie using data to redirect away from traffic hotspots) and accident/emergency uses. Of course there's privacy issues too - all of which need to be discussed. But if I see another 'linux won't crash' comment...

Pshoa.

[Mr_Icon]

If it could really park by itself, it would have to be able to do all of the following:

• Roam the parking lot for 20 minutes looking for a spot, with windows rolled down, blaring bad techno at the surrounings.
• Predatorily follow someone walking along the parking lot in the hopes that they will get in the car and pull out, and mouth them off in anger when realizing that they just wanted to pick up their wallet left in the car.
• Know not to park next to the door-dinging Canyonero.
• Mouth off at the "ass-clown in his fucking Porsche" who parked diagonally across two parking spaces.
• Yell "WHAT THE FUCK! THAT WAS MINE!" at the soccer mom who just pulled into the available space that you have spotted while four rows across and have been navigating to it ever since.
• Drop into neutral and rev up the engine behind the two old ladies who don't know any better to fucking get off the road.
• Bitterly bitch at the handicapped people for wasting perfectly good parking spaces that are never taken anyway.
• Say "that's it, I'm taking the goddamn bus next time!" at least once every two minutes while still circling the lot.
• Finally find a parking space after 30 minutes of circling, parking with the front wheels over the "absolutely no parking" line.
• Find that someone double-parked you upon your return, and be able to pull out over the curb, nearly leaving your exhaust pipe behind you.

Until then, don't talk to me about self-parking cars.

Key point missed

[Rei]

The key thing that people seem to be missing about this article is not the automation, but the fact that this is a *Linux Powered Car*. Bush has been pushing hydrogen, but Linux power is really the power of the 21st century.

Of course, I probably won't switch - my XML powered car has been working just fine for now.