by "Bryan doesn't drive a 1M" (bryantakespictures)
Published 01/31/2017 at 11:35
by "Bryan doesn't drive a 1M" (bryantakespictures)
Published 01/31/2017 at 11:35
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A few car trends have come together recently in awkward ways, but with a little work could be improved upon.
Many different driving modes, with varying levels of differentiation between them
Decent touchscreens and eventually maybe decent software
Digital dash
Adaptive dampers
Go / stop / turn by wire
Hybrid powertrains
What does all this mean? Butt-tons of complexity! But, with some reasonable planning and UI design, car-owners could customize their cars to a massive degree without even touching a screwdriver. Take, for example, the Olympus camera menu system:
It’s often knocked by reviewers as clunky and overly complicated, but owners of these cameras fall in love with the deep customization. You can re-program almost every button. You can set the logic and limits for auto-ISO selection. You can set up multiple presets for dinosaur/UFO hunting or family portrait day. This doesn’t even scratch the surface of the amount of customization possible.
What if your car could do the same thing? Picture some multi-purpose cars, such as the GTI or WRX. For simplicity, of course offer some default modes such as “sport” and “boring.” But, allow the user to create and name up to 1000 different modes and even download them off the web. What kind of thing could be customized in a driving mode, assuming the latest tech?
Engine tuning (eco, balanced, sport, long-term reliability, e85, etc.)
Throttle sensitivity
Brake sensitivity
Brake regen
Steering ratio
Steering weight
Steering feel
Damper settings front/back
For AWD: power distribution, allowed slip angle, etc.
For hybrids: power vs eco, minimum charge, regen settings
Traction control fine tuning, or on/off
Stability control fine tuning or on/off
Exhaust loudness, set a throttle position-to-volume curve
Exhaust crackles, burbles, pops
No fake engine noises through the speakers ever, in any mode, on any car, ever, ever
Auto-rev-matching
Hill start
For CVT’s, lots of options for “shifting” style
For autos/DCT’s, options for shift speed / smoothness, when to shift, etc.
Dash display: for sporty modes, center the tach and add info such as oil temp; for cruising modes, nav info, speed limit info, blind spot stuff
Main screen display: completely customizable, with skins and templates from the web
Button functionality (maybe the cruise control buttons would work better for turning on the seat warmers, who knows?)
Seat adjustment, including bolsters
Interior lighting
Speaker settings
Anything I missed? I should mention that all of this should come with good defaults, reasonable limits, and a good UI with explanations of what all the settings do and suggestions for how to set them. Also, I know a lot of these exist in various pieces, but it would be nice if they were all brought together.
"Textured Soy Protein" (texturedsoyprotein)
01/31/2017 at 11:45, STARS: 0
I have an Olympus camera and while the menu is very customizable I still wouldn’t call it good UI design. It’s all a bit fiddly.
I don’t think cars will go quite to the same degree of granularity of customization because while an enthusiast camera is by its nature supposed to have all those settings to twiddle, cars have a much wider audience, even enthusiast ones.
"Bryan doesn't drive a 1M" (bryantakespictures)
01/31/2017 at 11:54, STARS: 0
Yeah, the Olympus menu specifically could use some work, but it’s miles ahead of any car UI.