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Tesla Model S Software Updates Lets Car Park Itself With No One Inside It (bgr.com)
An anonymous reader writes with a link to this article at Boy Genius Report about a software upgrade now hitting Tesla owners, which begins: Tesla earlier today began pushing out version 7.1 of its software to Model S and Model X owners and, suffice it to say, it's a doozy of a software update. While we'll get to the full changelog shortly, we first wanted to highlight a feature called Summon which enables users to park their cars without having to be inside it. Conversely, it also lets Tesla owners summon their cars that already happen to be parked.
The feature is in Beta. Thats what I want: Beta software in my car. Here is a link to the release notes: http://www.teslamotorsclub.com...
It's not a "doozy" of an upgrade.
Duesy is short for Duesenberg, a car so awesome it could only be a Duesy.
Ehud
I wonder who'll get in trouble when the car has an accident while auto-parking?
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
Now hackers can just hack your car and make it steal itself without having to risk going to the location.
The programmer in me says that you can't design infrastructure and situations for people's level of ability to deal with the unexpected, and then rely on strictly less able primitive AI in the same situations on the same infrastructure.
I always visualise a busy car park with two self-driving cars both stopped with noses together, trying to get into the same parking space and unable to safely proceed, and traffic backed up out onto the main road trying to get in.
Would that be the exact case that trips them up? Maybe not.
Maybe it's the guy with a short trailer sticking into the otherwise eligible car space.
Maybe it's unusually narrow and some idiot (or self driving car, same thing really) who can't read arrows on the car park concrete has gone down the wrong way and someone has to reverse through mixed car park traffic or nearly scrape other cars to resolve the situation.
The point is, there will be some case it just can't handle without human supervision, resulting in it stopping in the middle of a place other people need to drive.
Also, remember that even if you think of these situations, it is extraordinarily difficult to be sure that it won't be thrown off by variations of these situations that human brains lump together but it can't.
I wonder if the upgrade passes the Baby Test: Lay down a 24 month old baby in the center of the parking spot, and summon the Tesla into to park itself. Expected outcome: There should be no leaking blood.
I saw the Batmobile do that years ago (in a movie, but I'm sure it was real).
If the update text has errors in it ( i.e. frunk instead of trunk, ref: http://www.teslamotorsclub.com... ), I hope the feature itself was better QA'd.....
That's not a typo. "Frunk" is Tesla's term for the front trunk.
I'm just waiting for the malware to hit these smart cars.
Just a few possibly lucrative scams that could manifest in due time:
Ransomware. "Pay us OMGWTFBBQ! dollars, or never drive your expensive status symbol ever again! We've encrypted the entire drive control computer's filesystem, so pay up."
Spyware: "Know where your spouse is REALLY going during the day! Our special software runs silently on smart cars to let you know exactly where and how long it has been running! Easy integration with our smartphone app!"
Law enforcement bullshit: "You say you were driving under the speed limit, but your car alerted us to the contrary. Enjoy your automated speeding ticket."
Adware: "Hello commuter! It looks like you are getting low on gas! Why not try Speedy's Gas and Go?" (Played loudly over the in-car speaker system, via coopted media control system., with no option to turn down the volume or stop the advert(s).)
And of course, the various kinds of dangerous hacker things--
Like:
"Drive your expensive smart car on remote control from a smart phone! (we wont be liable for damages or loss of life/injury from doing this.)"
Or--
Government black ops: "We caused his car to lock the user controls, and autodrove him off the side of an unfinished highway ramp. We made it look like he was driving while drunk."
I dont want to sound like a Luddite here, but really-- Not everything needs to be "Smart."
The linked article contains a misleading statement which is given as a quote: Autosteer is now “restricted to residential roads and roads without a center divider.” which implies that it can only be used on these type roads. Actually, the upgrade restricts driving on residential roads and roads without a center divider by limiting the maximum autopilot speed to 5 mph above the posted speed limit. So, quite a different spin. (Source Ver 7.1 release notes)
To avoid seeing this message again, always shut down your computer properly by selecting Shut Down from the Start Menu.
And who pays when it doesn't work exactly right and it crunches the car next to it? Who pays when it doesn't work exactly right and scrapes a wall? Will Tesla pay for this kind of accident?
If this system fails only one out of a 1000 times, that still means it's going to hit something sooner or later. Of course, I may hit something when I park, but then it's my fault for not taking more care.
I park my car 4 or 5 times a day on average, and a failure rate of 1-in-1000 means that by the end of the year the auto-parking is going to cause at least one contact event. Who's fault is it when the software stumbles and fails?
What about when some clown behind you tries to move at the same time the car is trying to self park?
What happens when the software doesn't read the surrounding environment just right and the car is left half in and half out of a space?
What happens when some jackass parks waaaaaaay too close to your car after it's already parked?
Don't get me wrong- I like the idea, I just see a *lot* of potential problems with implementing it in a real-world environment.
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
The video shows the car moving up to 39 feet in a straight line to get out of a tight garage. That's not really "parking". A "real" autopark would be if I could get out of the car at the door to my office, then send the car to go park itself in the lot.
Have gnu, will travel.
. . . car makes space for you!
summon their cars that already happen to be parked.
Who get's the $10 tip?
... we could just get out of our cars and have them drive endlessly around the block instead of looking for a parking space.
I am curious why just simple remote auto start/stop of your engine is not a standard option by now, it is something I had to add to me car via a 3rd party security system. It is mostly nice when heating up your car in the morning and turning on defrost.
If the parking space is too narrow, all you've done is fuck the drivers next to you who can't get into their cars until you move yours.
I think that gives them a view of maximum two sides, obscuring everything behind 50% of the car on the far side that's hardest to judge, and likely only two corners, personally.
Compared to the front, sides, and mirrors to the rear when sitting inside the car, even before you get into cameras etc. from a central location where you can see all without moving more than your head.
But, hell, I'm only a mathematician.
So it's a lot like driving the car yourself -- this should not be called "car parks itself" then. What happens if you can't see some hidden object while summoning and that object gets crushed by your car? I guess it's the summoner's fault.
A machine easily capable of killing me (and others) by a mere unintended 5 change of direction while driving on a highway is certainly the least machine that I want to receive over-the-air updates at any time.
Maybe Tesla is a little less profit-above-everything inclined than other companies at this time, but there's no reason to think it will stay like this. Just look how OTA-firmware upgrades have worked against owners of LG-TVs, PS3s and so on... one day, a pointy haired boss will decide to change Tesla car firmware to boost his profits, not your well-being.
... but Slashdot refuses to put the degree character into the title, even if HTML-encoded.
"Fapping the cruise stalk up or down; the set speed will be set to Model S's current speed."