Toyota Teams With Microsoft On Connected Cars (usatoday.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from USA TODAY: Toyota announced an enhanced relationship with Microsoft on Monday aimed at delivering "connected car" services to drivers in ways they probably never could have imagined. Already, drivers ask the infotainment system in their cars for restaurant recommendations, but many locations often would require that a driver turn around. But with Toyota Connected, the system might be modified to only recommend restaurants on the highway ahead -- and then only the kinds of food that the driver usually prefers. Road information can be delivered to drivers based on driving patterns -- knowing the routes they usually take. Auto insurance could be priced more accurately because the system could report on a driver's actual miles and routes traveled. Medical-related sensors could also be built into the car, like heartbeat monitors or sensors on the steering wheel. Some of the services could be offered to customers wirelessly by being beamed directly into their cars, but Lobenstein said that customer privacy considerations will be paramount. Toyota Connected hopes to have its first products within a year. Toyota Connected, as it's called, is built on Microsoft's Azure cloud computing platform. Toyota plans to invest $5.5 million in the new venture, even though much of the technology will be based on their current research and development for smart automobiles.

Comments

Unfortunate

[tripleevenfall]

I wonder if the car will automatically order a new version of itself for you when MSFT decides the one you've got is too old, and you need the latest and greatest.

Re:Unfortunate

[TheGratefulNet]

the car automatically orders new tires every 6mos whether you need them or not.

and every other order, they don't fit.

Re:Unfortunate

[Kjella]

That was the old Microsoft, with the new Microsoft you're always on the latest ad/spyware platform it just takes a 30% cut when it drives you to McDonald's.

Re:Unfortunate

[NoNonAlphaCharsHere]

I was thinking more old school:

You have successfully changed your radio station.
You must restart your car for the new changes to take effect.
Would you like to restart your car now?

Ford SYNC

[vossman77]

I love the Microsoft's MyFord Touch. It is the greatest thing ever. /sarcasm

Consumer Reports recommends that no one consider buying used 2011 Ford Edges equipped with MyFord Touch systems. As Ford has expanded availability of its MyFord Touch system to more vehicles, Consumer Reports has downgraded its ratings for vehicles so equipped

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

Re:Ford SYNC

[Puls4r]

Mod parent up, because it's the truth.

To be fair, Ford made some fairly boneheaded mistakes and still CONTINUES to make some of those same mistakes. For instance, removing tactile knobs for key functions like heater control and placing them on a touch screen is horrible for both ergonomics and safety.

Next, something nearly every actual engineer knows working on a manufacturing floor - you don't don't make a fucking button a TOGGLE. One button turns something on, another turns it off. Otherwise, the switch better be a rocker or flip switch where the state is obvious. This is impossible using a touch-screen system - so any critical controls need to be moved OFF the touch screen.

There is never a reason I should need to reboot my touchscreen. Never. And yet, Microsoft has managed it. I particularly like when the voice control gets confused, and just 'dings' repeatedly like it wants a command. Or when it starts randomly forgetting playlists and voice commands. Or when it tells me phone numbers aren't available when they are.

I love deleting my phone out of the system and having to put it back in so it re-downloads the phonebook and un-corrupts it. I also love having to pull my USB storage and reinitialize the whole system so it can clear it's memory.

I love how Ford, in their infinite wisdom, created a way for the early versions of sync to use google maps then REMOVED that ability again. All because they want us to use a pay service that they created that isn't even close to good. I love how simply apps like Pandora can't interface - again because Ford wanted to develop all their own systems in house because they want to be able to SELL that user data to make a profit.

I just got in a buddy's Ram. Pandora that is interfaced with the touchscreen. Made me want to cry. Better yet, he had actual buttons on the dash for most important functions - like turning off the backup warnings and other things that can be annoying at times.

Jesus Christu Ford, get out of your own way. You brought out Sync to be first, but managed to fuck yourself 7 ways from Sunday in trying to make the system itself profitable, and now your system is a laughingstock, still isn't half as capable as the competitions, and the overall interface design sucks giant donkey balls!

You don't CHANGE the fucking menu tree structure based on what menu I'm in. I should be able to go forward and backward through all the menu and system settings, but if I enter through the phone menu I can't go up a level to get to systems - I have to exit the menu entirely, change the... ARGH. Fuckit.

Re:Ford SYNC

[ArylAkamov]

This is exactly why I will never buy a car with a touch screen. Or flat buttons on the dashboard.

As it is, my 80s turbo shitbox has better design. Every button can be reached comfortably, every switch and button can be used by feel alone so I never have to take my eyes off the road.

Meanwhile, in the [CURRENT YEAR], we have touch screens and dashboards with a million flat square buttons that all feel the same.

http://imgur.com/a/HOWaH

See this shit? This drives me up the fucking wall.

BSOD! Clippy! Bob! Developers! Embrace/extend!

[Anonymous Coward]

Hate to tell you guys, but AI could replace your jobs as /. posters.

No more infotainment please.

[Moof123]

No more touchscreens in cars please. Seriously stop it.

Give me good knobs with detents, not too many of them, and let me get back to driving.

Also, please give me an analog speed display, I greatly prefer them. I loathe the digital display in my Nissan.

Re:Oh good

[zugmeister]

Auto insurance could be priced more accurately because the system could report on a driver's actual miles and routes traveled.

Does this sound like Pandora's box opening to anyone but me? This would be enough to cause me to buy another brand / model of car just to get away from it...

Toyota/Microsoft Happy Fun Car Tales

[Freshly Exhumed]

Driver: "Okay car, phone home."

Toyota/MS Connected Voice: "I phone home hundreds of times per second. Is that what you meant?"

Driver: "No, I need to talk to my wife. Phone home."

T/MS: "Dialing Microsoft Support..."

Driver: "No, Car, stop! NO NO NO, I mean stop calling, not stop the car in this busy lane!!!"

T/MS: "Hitler did nothing wrong."

Microsoft? No thanks.

[JustNiz]

Damn. I guess I won't be buying another Toyota then.

Clearly Toyota learned nothing from Ford

[DougReed]

The guys at Ford can feel comfortable knowing they are no longer the only suckers in the room.

Re:Oh good

[davester666]

Yes, really the only thing you can do is try to locate all the computers with cellular functions and either remove their antennae or disable the chips. Of course, you are still boned because the vehicle keeps track of all the data in its "black box" to be used to incriminate you.

Re:How do I turn it off?

[WaffleMonster]

Dear Toyota, don't you realize that distracted driving is illegal in most countries? Please remove your "infotainment" systems from all vehicles.

To turn it off you need only wait a year until the car is no longer supported and nothing but the tracking device works.

Re:So glad I like driving small pickup trucks

[drinkypoo]

Small pickups no longer exist in the USA (the smallest one now is almost as big as an F100 was) and fancy pants interior has been creeping into pickups lately, and now they look like cars inside. Since most Americans treat them like cars, they are now expected to drive like cars, which is making them shittier as trucks.

Re:One Word

[dcw3]

That's two words. And for the record, this can occur in completely mechanical designs as well. It happened to me in a '85 Hyundai Excel. Fortunately, it was simple enough to override...pushed the clutch to the floor, and watched the tach continue to climb...brake and turn off the ignition...easy peasy. Same thing when I restarted it, but after that no repeat, and the dealership couldn't find an issue.

Microsoft is a world leader

[gavron]

There's no doubt that Toyota is partnering with a world leader.

Microsoft has shown its ability to provide the lowest common denominator in secure operating systems since 1993.
That's 23 years of being #1 at the most easily-hacked awful excuse for shitty software engineering.

Mac people love macs. Good on them.
Linux people love linux. Good on them.
There's nobody who's a "windows person and loves windows", just people forced to support poor choices made by upper management that doesn't know tech but mandated "we will buy THIS and not THAT."

Toyota appears to have joined the crowd.
- I don't intend to have my car sit for an hour every "patch Tuesday" getting updated
- I don't intend to have my car randomly stop working and reboot
- Microsoft has a 20+ year track record of NOT DOING ANYTHING RIGHT. All their "advances" come from stealing from the MacOS/Linux crowd.

I think I'll keep driving my Hyundai. Sorry, Toyota, you bet on the loser horse.

E

No privacy concerns HERE!

[SoftwareArtist]

Auto insurance could be priced more accurately because the system could report on a driver's actual miles and routes traveled ... Lobenstein said that customer privacy considerations will be paramount.

Anyone notice a contradiction there?

"Your privacy is our top concern! That's why we're going to give your insurance company a complete record of everywhere you drive!"