Tesla touchscreen wiper controls land driver with fine after crash | Hacker News Reader

Tesla touchscreen wiper controls land driver with fine after crash

bbc.co.uk

98 pointstomduncalf143 comments

Previous discussion here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24025100

Touch screens are horrible for frequently used controls in cars.

Any car you are in is traveling with kinetic energy, so it is likely to bounce and move around over the road surface. Without a physical button to rest your finger on it's nearly impossible to get something on the first "touch" unless you are standing still.

Yes it looks cool, and yes it's fun to play with on a red light, but using any of these touchscreens even at 50 mph is nearly impossible.

Made much worse if it's a sports car and has a bit of a stiffer suspension.

One step forward, two steps backwards.

Added to this, the additional light, especially so close to the front window, reduces your visibility, certainly on pitch dark roads. You'd be amazed how well you can see on a pitch dark road, if all the interior light is switched off (or dimmed to a minimum), with just the running lights. No need for high beams in most cases. Big interior screens make a huge impact on this too.

You don't even need them to be big, even a low budget car's infotainment touchscreen is enough. Mine has adaptive brightness, so it means that at night in a dark road it'll be at lowest brightness, with black/gray, which makes it even less visible. It's still enough to screw with my night-vision when compared to old cars I had without interior lighting save for some very dim reds on important buttons.

The auto wiper on the model 3 works so well that I barely ever have to touch the manual control anyway. The thing I do use way more often is the windshield cleaner which does have a physical control. In the rare case where I need to switch the wipers to manual I have never considered it problematic even while driving.

For the most part I agree. The problem I have is with light mist or road spray (not this driver's situation) where it doesn't wipe enough, because the top of the windshield where the camera is is fine, but at my eye level it is not. But I just tap the physical button occasionally and don't really tough the manual controls.

The manual controls on the screen even pop open when you hit the button, so its just one tap of the screen to adjust the speed.

The 'excuse' I've heard is that cheap touch screens are cheaper for manufacturers than the old style of dashboard that had 10k little small plastic parts for all the buttons, sliders, and whatnot.

However this makes me wonder: is it still cheaper when using a large expensive panel like Tesla does? And even if so, what place do such cost-cutting measures have in [ostensibly] luxury vehicles?

I work in the automotive industry. Short answer: yes, it's still cheaper. Three things to consider:

1) Tesla's panel is not expensive. For a long time (maybe still), it wasn't automotive grade (rated for high temperature and shock/crash-proof operation) - they just used a standard consumer panel - bulk cost likely well under $300. For comparison, that's about the same cost as a traditional automotive head unit alone. Other items not included in a model 3 are also not cheap - for example, a standard wiper switch assembly is about $25 since it's fairly complicated and has pretty high QA standards. A standard instrument cluster is going to be close to $100.

2) You have to consider manufacturing cost, not just parts cost. Wiring is a huge pain in the ass on an assembly line since it's very difficult to automate and it's easy to mess up, so the more things you have to wire to different places in the cabin, the more labor time you have to pay for. Running everything via a single screen means you only have to wire components to the CAN bus and can drop a lot of the usual driver controls wiring harness pain.

3) The HN crowd is not indicative of the wider market. I learned this the hard way when working on an LCD-hard button hybrid interface for head unit controls. A lot of customers (maybe even most) absolutely love touch screens and think the Tesla central panel is fantastic. For them, an all-touch central interface is a marketing win rather than a drawback that needs to be explained away as a cost cutting measure. Model 3 is not targeted at older, high-end luxury vehicle buyers, it's targeted at environmentally conscious tech enthusiasts with a decent amount of cash and a bit of a craving for status signalling. If you draw a venn diagram, there's a pretty big overlap between this segment and the "wants touch controls" segment.

But by your own logic all they saved was, at most, $25 on a wiper switch, but they didn't really because the Tesla 3 already has a stalk on both sides, with all the associated labor. And, again according to your own evidence, they saved this tiny amount of money by doubling down on what is undoubtedly the most expensive component of the interior: the head unit and its display.

That's not how I read it. GP's #1 says that you're already saving $25 just looking at the cost of parts because the panel is about the same price as a traditional head unit and then there's the wiper switch. (Maybe you're right though, that they're not really saving on the switch.)

But then, #2, you factor in the cost savings associated with simplified manufacturing (which, as GP explains, goes well beyond just the wiper switch). This is what makes the panel approach much cheaper.

I'm just not seeing it. Flat panel display costs scales according to area. The Tesla 3 has a huge display. It surely costs a lot. And, Tesla isn't the kind of company that is either interested in or able to optimize for cost. They sell expensive cars and they lose a lot of money on them. They're also notorious for having ridiculously expensive assemblies, like the $2000 headlights of the Model S.

To me, the much more plausible aspect of the explanation is they think it looks cool/futuristic and their buyers are buying for reasons other than usability.

OK. But now it sounds like you're just disagreeing about the cost of the panel. That's fine. I certainly don't know how much the panel costs. But it's completely different from the previous point, right?

I'd also point out that Tesla is hardly the only automaker that is increasing its use of a single touchscreen for these functions. And, before that, manufacturers were already combining features into all-in-one units that were very similar in principle but controlled in different ways--such as with weird knobs, and other things. I expect it's a combination of consumer "wow factor"--which will probably wear off very soon--and streamlined manufacturing that drives this. But I'm no expert.

They saved $25 in parts on the wiper controls. They saved more on labor. They also saved parts and labor on controls for AC/heat/fan controls, mirrors, driving mode selection (comfort/sport), traction control, regenerative braking, heated seats, and probably a bunch of other things I'm missing.

For the wipers specifically, putting it in the screen is questionable for safety reasons. The rest of it definitely saves them money.

No, it's $25 parts savings for the wiper switch, some additional savings for the simplified steering column, an additional $100 parts savings for not having an instrument cluster (speedometer, tachometer, fuel gauge, etc.), additional savings for not having climate control hard buttons, and then at least $50 in labor and wiring savings due to the simplified installation.

And to your other comment, please look up bulk touchscreen panel prices on Alibaba. They are far cheaper than you seem to think, especially since the majority of the computing power is in a separate module. The model 3 uses the LG LA154WU1-SL01 panel. It is not expensive (under $300 in bulk) and continues to get cheaper.

I wonder if this is a price thing or more of a result of Tesla's development model. With a touchscreen, you can design and iterate. UX can be delayed until the latest stages of development when you already have physical designs in hand. Then again, we're probably over thinking it. I'm sure cool factor was the #1 reason for this sort of implementation.

There's no way that's the reason. I just recently bought an instance of the cheapest car Honda still markets in the USA and it has _great_ steering wheel controls, improved even from the ergonomics of my last Honda which was a top-of-the-line model and trim. 18 functions on the face of the wheel, more stuff on two paddles and two stalks behind the wheel. It's one of the cheapest cars you can buy.

https://ef2a5a53b98055d22ce3-7a5c64ec0d36aa3941021bc0fe9ef43...

Honda products are also consistently higher priced compared to their competitors. The Fit is basically the most expensive (and nicest) subcompact economy car in the US.

Other competitors are willing to sacrifice those details in order to undercut Honda (also note the mirror and window controls): https://newchevy2020.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/2021-Che...

The Spark starts at $1700 under the price of the Fit.

Yikes. Still it looks like it has physical buttons for everything. Probably just doesn't have cruise control and lane keeping and therefore doesn't need buttons for that?

No buttons for the mirrors or the windows, because they're not even power! The spec sheet doesn't list power locks as a feature either, it says the car comes with "Keys, rigid (2)"

It definitely doesn't have cruise or lane keep assist.

They are easier to update too with new features and buttons. The parent's point about tactile being better when driving is still valid though.

> large expensive panel like Tesla

Tesla used non automotive-grade panels to keep costs really low. They started delaminating and the solution was to have everyone's cars run the air conditioner even when the car is unoccupied, causing a big negative impact on effective mileage in the city, but it actually got great response from fans with slick marketing around it. It saved Tesla a lot of money in recalls, but is not great environmentally.

The interior couldn't handle the heat of being parked in the sun? This is a very basic standard. Every BMW, ford, Ferrari or Honda is tested in a chamber with heat lamps. I cannot imagine any Honda engineer suggesting that the car run the AC in order to protect the interior parts.

And it isn't all about the customer. Would one of these teslas survived on a used car lot? Could it survive being transported across the country on the back of a truck? A car that cannot survive direct sunlight is a logistical nightmare.

That’s the difference between screens designed for cars and what Tesla picked. Consumer grade LCD panels that might be used in monitors or TVs aren’t designed to sit in 150F heat repeatedly, while a LCD panel for a car absolutely should be.

In my BMW the navigation screen started to peel after 4 years (small area in the corner about 2mm x 6mm). They have replaced screen assembly under the warranty, list price was $2,500+

A lot of what's "very basic standard" for other car companies gets ignored by Tesla. Sometimes that's good, sometimes that's bad.

I understand the need to break conventions, but there is a heat advisory in my area today. My Honda gets parked outside. And when things go wrong I occasionally do 15+ hour shifts. I'd be screaming mad if I came out after one of those days to find my car's battery was dead and the screen delaminated. But that is why I bought a Honda. I cannot sync my ipod list with my google cloud account, but it always starts when I ask it to.

Another example in the "bad!1" category is the flash chips in one of the control units. They had logging enabled, and over time the control unit killed its own flash chips by overwriting them too often. Needs the entire unit changed, or finding someone who'll solder fresh chips in.

Where a traditional design would have taken care to run entirely from a read-only storage, and if there is logging needed, to log to an extra partition that doesn't stop the system from working if it becomes unavailable.

Ah yes, I recall something about this. They tried to pretend the fans were a safety feature to keep kids/dogs safe in parked cars, except the fans didn't automatically turn on until the car was already hot enough to be lethal.

I’m genuinely surprised that never killed anyone. Marketing that as a “pet and child mode” just seemed to beg for problems.

Don't own a Tesla, and am just going from memory. I believe the "pet mode" was implemented the same time the interior protection feature was. So the pet mode was a user option to allow the car to be kept at a reasonable temp for pets / kids, whereas the interior protection feature would automatically kick in if it got too hot regardless of what the user wanted.

Tesla large panels are quite cheap since they are not automotive grade. However not being designed to stand the high temperatures that can be found in a vehicle habitacle under the sun, depending of the climate in your area they will eventually fry every 6 months.

The Model 3 has a very easy to use touchscreen interface for the wipers, it's hard to imagine someone missing it or being distracted for more than 1 second while using it.

Apart from that, it also has this feature that makes using the touchscreen for the wipers while driving completely unnecessary (when they're on "automatic"): https://youtu.be/1Rr_XzzJ6gc?t=58

Finally, there's also voice controls: "Wipers increase" and you're done.

It's not magic, the horrible thing we still have is courts with clueless/uninterested judges.

From the article:

> The Tesla Model 3 automatically adjusts the speed of the wipers depending on how heavy its sensors believe the rain is. > It can be switched on and off from the steering wheel, but adjusting the interval needs to be done on the touchscreen.

And, more relevant:

> ...the driver complained to the higher regional court. Windscreen wiper control was, he argued, a safety-related feature that he needed to access.

Your attack on "judges" is misplaced too:

> The higher court disagreed, backing the first judgement. Whether or not the screen was a permanent part of the car was irrelevant, it decided - and it did not matter why the driver was looking at a touchscreen while driving, only that he did so.

I'm not saying you are, but from your comment it really seems you did not read the article and only rushed into the comments to defend Tesla.

> Finally, there's also voice controls: "Wipers increase" and you're done.

If the driver had used voice control he would not have been fined.

> It's not magic, the horrible thing we still have is courts with clueless/uninterested judges.

In Germany, judges are supposed to apply existing laws, not to amend or alter them based on their "clues" and "interests".

> In Germany, judges are supposed to apply existing laws, not to amend or alter them based on their "clues" and "interests".

They are also required to honor the original intent behind the law and that was to prevent distraction from mobile phones and similar devices, not from vehicle controls.

> the horrible thing we still have is courts with clueless/uninterested judge

The judge is not ruling about the UI/UX or Tesla or the car, only that the driver chose or allowed himself to be distracted and become a danger. You seem to agree that it's the driver's fucking problem to learn how to use the car without becoming a danger, so why would you then go insult the judge?

A physical wiper knob is also not magic, but Tesla's engineers were too clueless/uninterested to add it.

> It's not magic, the horrible thing we still have is courts with clueless/uninterested judges.

The driver fiddled with the touchscreen and caused a crash, and was punished for that. So you are saying the driver shouldn't have been punished for fiddling with the touchscreen because he didn't have to use the touchscreen? Wouldn't that be a bigger reason to think the driver is at fault?

This seems... odd, in that presumably the regulators allowed the car to be sold with essential functions dependent on the touchscreen in the first place, so it's strange to fine someone for accessing essential functions. IMO the proper solution would have been to force Tesla to have a more sensible interface in the first place...

If I crashed my regular car as a result of excessive attention paid to my old-school two-knob radio, it seems like that should quite sensibly be evidence of a road safety violation on my part as well, IMO.

But that's not an essential function. The driver must contend with the wiper interface while driving.

There's a physical button to turn on the wiper. It just doesn't have the full range of controls for speeds and on/off as physical controls as the automatic wipers are supposed to be used instead. The automatic wipers aren't particularly good though which is why people end up fiddling with the controls. The touchscreen interface isn't too bad, it only takes a single touch, but it's not like the tactile experience of a physical stalk with all the wiper options.

The article claims "In this case, the driver had to navigate software menus and then choose from one of five settings, after touching an icon."

He didn't have to do that, that's another way to reach the same place. If you press the physical button that turns on the wipers the software menu is displayed as well and it only takes one touch to do anything else.

This sounds like a bad UI. They should really follow the Zen of Python principle "There should be one-- and preferably only one --obvious way to do it."

I wouldn't say that problem exists, there's a single UI that gets brought up from either the physical button that also runs the wipers once or the on screen button. The UI is very obvious it just forces you to look at it. Having the UI in the top of the screen would probably be a good idea so that more of the road stays in your field of vision.

I think a lot of these systems should definitely have buttons besides the touch screens so you can physically feel them out and touch them after you glance quickly, cause touching a touch screen involves looking at the screen, unlike pressing a button.

But he didn't have to press the physical button. The wipers start automatically, right?

The automatic wipers are famously bad because Tesla decided to save money on the sensor and try and detect rain with image processing instead. Even after many updates they're still not great. So it's perfectly possible to need to turn on the wipers manually in some situations but the physical button is by far the most convenient way to do that.

What happens if the wipers start automatically, but you need to adjust the speed?

The wipers have 5 modes: Off, 1, 2, 3, Auto. Auto will keep wiping as long as it figures there's water on the windshield. If you want a different speed, you need to go into the touchscreen.

If you want a single wipe, you can press the button on the steering wheel controls. This would also bring up the touchscreen menu for wiper speed directly, for a 1-touch change. Or 2-touch, if you count the steering wheel stalk button press.

It sounds like it was the setting for frequency of intermittent wiping?

It's your responsibility to buy a car you can operate without causing an accident. If you can't use its wiper interface without losing control, don't buy it.

The same as when people buy power cars which are difficult to drive without training and then oversteer and crash.

I agree with your two sentences, but would add that a driver has a more fundamental must which is to correctly prioritize their attention so as to avoid causing a single-vehicle crash via distraction. Whether it's a two-knob radio, a touchscreen wiper control, swatting at a bee, or handling a sneeze is largely irrelevant as to where the most immediate responsibility for the crash lies, IMO.

What if it’s impossible to see due to the rain?

There is a huge difference between a radio and a wiper control. Wipers are not some optional thing you can ignore for a while, they’re essential for safe driving and should be accessible to the driver without distraction.

> What if it’s impossible to see due to the rain?

Then you turn on the wipers with the button on the stalk, like most cars.

> What if it’s impossible to see due to the rain?

If you can no longer see due to rain, stop the car.

There's a physical button to wipe once. It's definitely possible to operate this car safely with nothing but mechanical controls. The only thing I'd like to be able to assign to the wheel controls are fog lights. It's only when you start trying to use more complex features while driving that some other cars with mechanical controls might work better.

The driver has the option to slow down or fully stop if they cannot safely operate the car.

Maybe you've never driven in flash floods, with hectic traffic and rain volumes that can shift between moderate and severe almost instantly. If you suddenly lose visibility, I think it's much safer to be able to flip your wiper dongle up to max than to slow down or try to pull off the road in an already chaotic traffic situation.

I have. Yes, it would be safer if Tesla provided suitable switches, but absent that - your primary responsibility as driver is to safely control your car and that includes only driving as fast as visibility and road conditions allow. That means stop immediately if your visibility drops to zero, be it that your wipers can’t keep up or that you’re driving an unfamiliar car and you cannot find the wiper control. What would you do if you ran out of wiper fluid and mud or salt obscured your windshield? Blow through it? Turn on the hazard flashers if you need to.

Your first priority is to keep the car safely on the road and not run into any obstacle. Everything else takes second priority. If you fail to do that, you’ve failed your task as driver, you most likely were too fast.

Stopping in the roadway is itself an unsafe condition and you are certainly going to get rear ended, if not cause a massive pile up, particularly when visibility is poor.

Rear ending another car or running into an obstacle because you’re flying blind is not exactly a better option.

I think the European courts still expect you to behave responsibly and not forgoe usage of your brains just because someone put a regulatory stamp somewhere.

This US-like transfer of responsibility to more and more overbearing regulators (and regulating corporations like Apple/Google/et. al.) has always seemed very harmful to me.

I wonder if the driver could, in turn, sue Tesla. Tesla sold him a car without legally usable wiper controls.

I doubt it, there were several legally usable options to allow him to control the wipers without the screen.

What were they? According to the article, there were physical controls to turn the wipers on and off but not to adjust the speed.

This is America. Why not?

The case is in Germany though!

However it could indeed lead to mandatory safety standards requiring physical controls.

The driver just forgot the song from his childhood

"When you need to adjust car controls don't forget: Pull to the side of the road."

The relevant ruling on electronics was made after Tesla's were declared road-legal in Germany.

Having had a Model 3 for eight months now, the interface is something you learn to live with rather than ever feeling totally confident with.

The buttons etc are designed for a car that can run the wipers etc flawlessly itself but the tech isn’t there yet.

I read somewhere that the Model 3 was intended to be fully autonomous, which was why the interface and look of the car is as spartan as it is. When the autonomous tech ended up not being there (no surprise), Tesla kept the look of the car as if the car were meant to drive itself.

This is probably why CarPlay and Android Auto still aren’t integrated, among other reasons.

Every single engineer and executive working at Tesla right now needs to grab a copy of The Design of Everyday Things and read it cover to cover before returning to work.

The problem is that hardware buttons are expensive - expensive in pure cost, expensive in more material required for installation (cables, handles, complex plastic) and most importantly - expensive in time to manufacture.

This is why all companies are moving eveything to touchscreens - the cost savings are very real when it comes to building a certain amount of units in certain amount of time. And this is why the company with most manufacturing issues, Tesla, also went all in in making the cockpit as minimal as possible.

Sure there might be other reasons, but as always... follow the money :)

It's not like Tesla doesn't have people who know a wiper stalk is good

It's just their design goals are not "make the most convenient or practical control we can"

They're "make it cheap to manufacture" "make it easy to manufacture" and "make it perpetuate the vague feeling of futurism we go for"

The giant touch screen is at the intersection of all three. It's truly awful, but people convince themselves "this is the future!". And they say stuff like "I can't imagine going back to anything else" because by comparison the buttons feel dreary and old.

Then to keep up other manufacturers start to follow suite and now even pickup trucks are bragging about having 12 inch touch screens in their advertisements and how the competing truck doesn't ...

This is one of the reasons I chose not to purchase a Model 3. Two of my co-workers bought one and raved about it, I just couldn't get over the fact that the touchscreen was a single point of failure for the entire car.

This is about windshield wipers, not door handles.

Just kidding! But, my assumption is that an engineer isn't the one making design decisions about the touchscreen UI at Tesla.

I'd go so far as to guess that the decision to move every possible control from the dashboard into software might have come from the top of the org chart, or near it. I have no idea if it's true, but it feels like one of those "visionary leader" decisions made by someone with little accountability and a lot of Dunning-Kruger.

Not just Tesla. Every car manufacturer. So far it's only Mazda IIRC who said they are getting rid of touch controls. Meanwhile Mercedes Benz proudly advertisers this crap: https://youtu.be/SuFE5x6fPqw

Mercedes and Audi are easily the worst offenders right now.

No, Volkswagen is even worse. Have a look at the Mk8 golf or even the ID.3 - literally everything is a touch surface, made out of shiny black plastic. Volume controls, climate controls, "buttons" on the steering wheel are tiny touchpads.....it's truly truly awful. I've used the latest Golf recently and the fact that the only way to adjust temperature is to swipe your finger on a tiny touch surface without any feedback is just mindboggingly stupid.

Not Toyota.. They always have stuff that's 1 gen behind, but it always works the way it should.

The cruise control knob on Toyota cars is not very user-friendly, to say the least.

So has Honda

You do see the buttons that do almost everything you'd want to do while driving on the steering wheel right?

Along with a voice operated climate control, you don't need to touch the screen, ever

Did you actually watch the video? It clearly shows the driver being distracted by controls on the touch screen to "share" media with a backseat passenger. That's a terrible design that could easily lead to deaths.

First off, it doesn't let you share media or most of the more advanced functions if the car is in any form of motion.

Second... are you kidding me?!

A driver deciding to look down at their screen to share media while driving would be blamed... on the infotainment, is that a joke?

By that logic you're also allowed to look down at your cupholder and count the crumbs that have accumulated, that's a terrible design and the cupholder should be mounted at your sightlines.

Normally I'm in the "putting screens in is adding unnecessary temptation" camp, but please.

Personal culpability is still a concept.

MB kept all the stalks that make sense, they kept the steering wheel buttons, they kept physical buttons for stuff specific screens. They did fine for the parameters they're playing with, which is "Tesla has made not sticking a giant touchscreen in your car not seem futuristic".

> You do see the buttons that do almost everything

"Almost" is to say that no, it's not enough. Show me climate controls on the steering wheel.

> Along with a voice operated climate control

No. A very very small minority of people operate anything via voice control. Especially in cars where voice control is universally horrendous.

You can control the screen from the steering wheel buttons, and there's a dedicated home button, so you can get to a given control with a repeatable set of inputs on the wheel.

Same with the console mounted touchpad.

Both of which don't require the level of coordination touching a touchscreen would require.

There's also the fact they're giving people what they wanted, voice control suck but that's how you make it work with a giant touch screen, and people's buying habits and feedback on Teslas have shown it's what they want.

It wasn't until last year Tesla's voice input was even doing natural language-ish stuff. MBUX meets the (low) bar that's been set.

>You can control the screen from the steering wheel buttons, and there's a dedicated home button

Riiight. And to see where exactly you are on the screen you need... guess what, look at it.

> There's also the fact they're giving people what they wanted, voice control suck but that's how you make it work with a giant touch screen

Yup. You got it all backwards.

- They install a huge touchscreen with horrible controls

- These controls are incredibly bad, and are a hazard when the car is in motion

- Instead of fixing the horrendous UX, they patch it with voice control

- Voice control, by your own admission, sucks

So, no, they are not giving people what the want. People want sane and safe controls inside a car. A huge touchscreen with no physical buttons, tiny controls and touch targets, and a voice control that sucks is not what people want.

> MBUX meets the (low) bar that's been set.

How about raising the bar instead of leaving it on the ground?

> Riiight. And to see where exactly you are on the screen you need... guess what, look at it.

If your cognitive functions are a limiting factor, sure?

One of my cars has a touch screen and a knob to control it. It took my about 2 days of owning the car to know how many knob clicks to get to "Change input".

At worst I might glance at it for a second if I overshoot by an item, no different than when we had individual knobs for everything and you might occasionally glance to see how far you turned the knob

Also, maybe read things twice.

> voice control suck but that's how you make it work with a giant touch screen

Read that again, slowly.

It means that they add a touch screen and make it work by patching in voice. You didn't need to repeat my point for me.

Your problem is you think this is some sort of debate where I'm backing "Team Big Touchscreen And Voice Controls" and you're going "aha! Gotcha! You don't like voice either!"

No. I don't. But you're wrong, people do want touchscreens and crappy voice controls, and Tesla's cult following is proof.

That garbage interior is hailed as futuristic over it's tablet, and everyone is following them because, despite your illusion that what you want is what everyone wants .. people like the idea of a big shiny touch screen in their car to make it "futuristic", that's why people end ip retrofitting 12 inch screens into their 10 year old Camry now.

MBUX is above the bar that's been set in useability, but they don't set the bar because they don't have the image or mind share to do so. If tomorrow morning Tesla removed the screen and replaces it with AR goggles I promise you that will be the new bar.

> If your cognitive functions are a limiting factor, sure?

> maybe read things twice.

> Read that again, slowly.

Ad hominem attacks, how nice.

> they add a touch screen and make it work by patching in voice.

Exactly. What I said: they made a horrible UX, and then patched it by adding more horrible UX. It's decidedly not what consumers want.

> people do want touchscreens and crappy voice controls,

Nope, people don't want that. But they are left no choice.

> MBUX is above the bar that's been set in useability, but they don't set the bar because they don't have the image or mind share to do so.

Because they are blind following the one-eyed, that's what you're saying. It does cost extra money and extra care to create a workable touch-screen experience that doesn't rely on "but there are tiny buttons on the wheel and voice controls". Volvo can do that (even though their touch screens are far from perfect), why can't Mercedez?

Oh, right, how can one forget, because horrible UX is "what people want because that's the bar". Cry me a river.

Edit. It's actually amazing that they have a 23-minute overview in a static non-moving car [1], and they keep

- doing accidental touches

- inputing wrong commands

- being very-very careful and precise with what they touch on screen because all the touch targets are so small

In a non-moving car. It's amazing, really, in a horrendous kind of way.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQKloYcRMVE

If you read slowly (which is not an insult, you clearly need to read and think about what you're reading before responding, because it's clear your just sending kneejerk reactions to every line I've written and not actually digesting them)

You'll understand that the crux of your misunderstanding, which I've clarified twice now is:

> they made a horrible UX, and then patched it by adding more horrible UX. It's decidedly not what consumers want.

It is what they want.

Go and look at which automaker is worth almost 1.5x Toyota's market cap after launching a car that gets you fined for changing your wiper speed since it's all on a touch screen.

Go look at which car people tout as the most futuristic.

Go look at which interior is shown rubbing shoulders with Bentleys in interior design rankings: https://www.roadandtrack.com/new-cars/g22496899/best-new-car...

See which car everyone drools over setting the bar for form and function: https://www.businessinsider.com/tesla-model-3-interior-is-a-...

I mean seriously, you'd have to be blind to not see that automakers are now chasing Tesla because people have convinced themselves, maybe through Musk's charisma or some misguided aspiration that this is the future:

https://robbreport.com/motors/cars/leaked-images-of-the-new-...

https://www.businessinsider.com/tesla-model-3-interior-is-a-...

I said it very plainly, you seem unable to divorce your personal preferences and views from reality of what people want.

I hate the giant touchscreens but that doesn't mean I'm going to ignore the fact people rant and rave about the interior that started this trend.

It also doesn't mean I'm not going to give credit where due as a manufacturer kowtows to demands, but manages to pull some additional function out of the burning wreckage that is now "what is in, in car UX".

Maybe if you read my comments through that lens instead of acting like this is some kind of high school debate team practice, you'll finally understand why I'm saying you're missing my point (repeatedly).

Frankly I find that more appealing than the airplane dashboard that are currently MBs. I was actually just wondering the other day as I was driving with family owning one (well, two) if they will take the route of Tesla and get rid of the bazillion useless buttons.

"Removing bazillion useless buttons" != remove all physical buttons especially those that are often used.

That's why I hate having to deal with touch controls in cars for basic functions. I like having tactile feedback so I can control them without needing to look, or just having a glance instead of having to focus navigating through an interface. Don't get me wrong I love how smarter cars are getting but some things just shouldn't be made "smart" imo.

I don't think the main reason car companies are shifting more and more functionality to touchscreens is because of the perception that they're "smart". I think it's because touchscreens are cheaper, especially in terms of development costs, since it's easier to iterate in software than hardware. I'm not super knowledgeable about the field though, so maybe someone who's worked at a car company can help explain.

Mazda is ditching touchscreens, and I doubt they’ll be the last (if they survive 2020).

Safety controls aren’t something that should be subject to “move fast and break things.”

I'm not saying the cost savings are necessarily worth it. I strongly dislike the move to touchscreen interfaces in situations where they don't make sense. I think cost savings might be a reason many car companies have chosen (IMO) a clearly worse interface, especially if you look at it from the perspective of an executive trying to decrease costs.

Sadly they kind of forgot about that in electric Mazda MX-30, which proudly adds a touchscreen for climate controls -_-

Tesla's automatic wipers are bizarrely bad. At one point Elon touted a new neural net upload that was going to make them better, but they actually got worse.

My Dodge truck has much better automatic wiper control than my Tesla.

That's because the Model 3 doesn't have a dedicated rain sensor but tries to detect rain with the built-in cameras.

Oh. Dear. God.

I wouldn't have guessed.

No Tesla but I have a Chrysler minivan. I've never needed to do anything with the wiper controls in the three years we've had it. Between Musk's erratic behavior and issues like these, my desire to have a Tesla has dramatically decreased.

Automatic wipers have ALWAYS been bad. The old Nissan 200SX had a wiper sensor and it was one of the first things to fail on that car.

Tesla's touch screen interface is probably one of the worst interface decisions in car history. It takes two taps on your touch screen to just open a glovebox - in what way is that better than a handle, which is completely intuitive, way faster, and usable without having to look at a screen. Or their fans, where you have to use the touch screen to change their direction - why not just have a tab you can move around like every other car. In my Honda Fit, I can adjust the temperature and fan direction in about 2 seconds without taking my eyes off the road. In a Tesla it requires me to look at a screen and tap like 10 times to navigate the menus.

Touch screens are a much worse interface that physical interfaces in many cases, especially when you are driving. I don't understand why you would take away almost all feedback and speed from some control, and consider it progress.

Not sure if everyone's familiar what is actually in the Model 3/Y.

- The main mode of use is 'auto' which uses as its feedback sensor the forward facing camera (I think only this location, but not 100% sure about that) located where the rear view mirror attaches to the wind screen. It covers ~75% of my driving without issue. I think there is a problem with that sensor location as the boundary layer gets compressed near the apex of the windscreen, resulting in better mass transport and a drier windscreen than the part the driver looks through. This camera location is thus a laggy indicator of rain because it tends to be one of the driest parts of the car. Personally my experience with the this feature is a good advertisement not to get full self driving yet: If you can only answer the question "Is it raining?" accurately 75% of the time with cameras, you've probably got a long way to go on FSD.

- There is a physical button on the end of the left stalk. You press it to get 'wipe once'. If you need to respond quickly to a sudden burst of rain or the driver next to you goes through a big puddle, you can do that without the touchscreen.

- The physical button push also brings up the wiper control on the touchscreen, which is otherwise behind one (non physical) button which is always on the screen. The touchscreen controls include manual control of wipers on/off/auto and wiper speed.

- There is also voice control which seems to work fine. As with many voice control systems, you have to say a specific phrase, which presents a discovery problem: how do users learn that phrase unless they're the kind of people who search out documentation on the internet. I'd also wager many drivers haven't gotten used to the idea of voice control of car features so they're not well utilized in general.

And for your consideration, my opinion: It works fine most of the time (because I just leave it in auto), but I occasionally need to tap the physical button to get an extra wipe. Sometimes when it is very lightly raining I need to manually set the speed since the feedback system doesn't seem to do a good job in that scenario. The touchscreen feels pretty accurate and responsive, so I've never had trouble hitting the button while in motion. I think Tesla should release a software update to let the user 'double tap' the physical button to force the wipers 'on-high' for the rest of the journey.

I have had mine for quite a while, and don't think I have ever used the voice controls for anything. If I ever did it might have been to try navigation when I first got it. I honestly did not even know you could voice control the wipers. Definitely a discovery problem there.

> As with many voice control systems, you have to say a specific phrase, which presents a discovery problem: how do users learn that phrase unless they're the kind of people who search out documentation on the internet.

The internet? The car doesn't come with a manual? Doesn't _every_ car come with a manual?

It has a manual accessible through the screen, but most people just google it anyways. I certainly did.

Regardless of the merits of touch control UI on cars (or their lack-of) it's a stupid idea to fine the driver in this situation. Maybe the law enforcers want to make an indirect point...

If the vehicle is _road legal_ (that is it has stop lights, breaks etc) then it is assumed that it can be used legally on public road. If the touch interface would make the driver break some laws then the vehicle should _not_ be road legal in the first place.

From an ISO 26262 perspective, it seems like for the driving scenario of "unexpected windshield wiper speed increase", they may have set the controllability to C0 (Controllable in general) [1] when it may have needed to have been something less controllable (C1 means 99% of drivers can avoid harm in the condition, C2 means 95%, C3 means less than 90%). That probably set their risk level to something lower than it actually was. They probably need to do some tests for anything they're diverting to the touchscreen to figure out how many drivers can manage the situation within the time frame of avoiding a crash.

It looks like Tesla's job postings reference ISO 26262 experience as a plus [2], but I can't get a straight answer to Tesla's adherence to it in-house. My understanding is that no government mandates its use, but lots of car companies adopt it anyway.

[1] ISO 26262-3:2011(E) Table B.4 [2] https://www.tesla.com/careers/job/software-integrationengine...

Hope this prompts them to put the windshield wiper controls on a stalk or the steering wheel. Never been comfortable with that part of the interface.

I don't own a Tesla, but when it automatically enables the wipers, does the UI on the touchscreen "adapt" to current conditions and bring the wiper speed controls to the top level so it's one touch away? Or does the driver still have to touch through N menus to get to it at all times? If so, that's a terrible driver experience. :-(

On the Model 3 (the car in this article), the wiper controls are on a 'card' that you can swipe across to bring up. When the wipers are activated, either automatically or manually by the stalk on the steering wheel, that also brings that 'card' to the front.

Model 3 owner -- when you press the quick wipe button on the left stock it brings up the wiper interface menu to adjust the wipe speed and the auto wipe button. It's very quick and only requires a short glance and one screen press.

One way to improve it would be after the left stocks quick wipe button is pressed, let us adjust the speed with the steering wheel control wheel with a volume based auditory click to indicate it's gone up or down. Although those are used for volume and speed if cruise or autopilot is enables so it would need to only stay in wiper speed adjust for a few seconds

> requires a short glance

Just as short as checking whether I got a text message?

Shorter

I have always wondered how Tesla is allowed to sell cars where the controls are so touch-screen-heavy. It does seem far less intuitive and more distracting than the convention for many controls.

I always assumed there was some rigorous usability test they’re required to undergo.

I think device distraction is dangerous in traffic. The whole point is that you as a driver or cyclist need to be aware of other traffic participants. If you are distracted with a device you are not paying attention. Thus agree with the court ruling.

It’s better with physical touch controls to control car functions.

Consider search depth, physical device control is direct access hash table. But touch button interfaces are like searching through a list/tree so slower.

Misuse of technology --- technology that actually detracts from usability.

Provide essential info and control in the simplest possible manner. If you feel the need for additional gadgetry, use voice recognition and response --- something with minimal distraction from the essential task at hand.

"Tesla touchscreen wiper controls land driver with fine after crash"

These headline-esque sentences are very hard to parse without context sometimes. It took me ages to figure out this one. It's a small hobby of mine.

The wiper controls the land-driver? Glad they clarified it wasn't the sea-driver.

But don't worry, it's fine. It was not damaged in the crash.

I don’t know how anyone who has ridden in a car and used a capacitive touchscreen could come to the conclusion that the two should be combined in one product. Especially for controlling safety features.

The stupid touch screen controls on the Tesla are the one and only reason why I refuse to buy one (and I have test driven a number of them and love everything else about them).

This was discussed here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24025100

Theres seem to be a hardware button to turn these on and off. The solution should be simple: - Long press to turn on and off. - Press many times to change speed.

Short press is wipe once, long press is spray cleaner to wash windshield currently. I would like to see double tap to turn on or something. Or what about tap it and then one of the scroll wheels on the steering wheel to adjust speed. Not great, but would be possible with the hardware they have.

Could also be same as I said but very long press to spray cleaner.

I hate the arrogance of the Model 3 that everything should be touchscreen. It’s very dangerous to do even the simplest things while driving, like turning off the fan. You have to find the right location on the touchscreen and then hold it down for a few seconds. Trying to change the direction of the fan is basically impossible to do safely while driving. Things like those should have been physically things like knobs that people can change safely without having to look.

At least they didn't put the pedals and the steering wheel on the touchscreen. Yet.

(By the way, we're in 2020. Weren't we supossed to get self-driving cars without pedals and steering wheels by now?)

Well it is a Tesla, you can buy it with "Full Self-Driving" so surely it doesn't actually need any pedals...

I guess that really depends on the user, I setup my fan position once.

No need for knobs.

I agree the wiper controls could be better though. Would be great if a combination of the wiper button + scroll wheel could change the interval.

Which version is your Model 3?

Long range AWD

You didn't know about the controls before purchasing it?

I didn’t realize how shitty and dangerous they were until after driving it for a while.

I looked into getting a Tesla but decided against it because of the all touchscreen UX.

I find it inexcusable that Teslas don't have voice commands.

"Tesla, slow down the wipers."

But they do?

The voice recognition is a bit sub-par IMO, but I can control the wipers by voice if I want.

Shocker: they do.

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