Explain to me like I’m 5…is software really that hard?

[sparked]

All new hardware. Infotainment isn't the same. Exterior cameras are not the same. Pet mode interior camera isn't the same. etc etc.

Hopefully less traumatic over time as the hardware and software matures. At least for R2, it makes sense to me why there's a lag. Or even why the software on R2 may not be perfect at launch.

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[tate16t]

When I saw the long list of features released (and still pending) via update 2026.20 I wondered why they released the R2 without all of this functionality. Now they also have to deal with a bunch of new customers who are not familiar with the update process.

 

[usulio]

Simple software is easier. Complex software is hard. Rivian consistently chooses to make everything fancier and more complex than it needs to be. For example they are using a 3d game engine to run their user interface, it's a huge piece of software with a huge learning curve. I am not saying the complex approach is the wrong decision for their brand. But you also get bugs and it takes longer to ship stuff.

For an example of simple versus complex just look at craigslist's website. They have chosen to keep things simple. The site is really fast, works really well, never goes down, never breaks. Compare to many modern web pages that take 30 seconds to load what is essentially a little bit of text, has bugs and lag, the sites break all the time. And those developers complain about the difficulty and complexity of supporting all the browsers and devices and scaling the back end. But in reality a lot of it is self inflicted tradeoffs when a website to display text is tens of thousands of lines of code. I believe this is also the prevalent culture at Rivian as most software companies.

 

[Dark-Fx]

Software is incredibly easy. You should try it yourself sometime.

 

[lefkonj]

Software is really hard but the harder part is meeting marketing deadlines while not only delivering features but quality. This is where companies, not just Rivian, are struggling today. Apple, Google, Cisco, Rivian, Tesla, everyone is struggling with this. The company says X product or feature will be out on this date or this quarter and in order to meet it they strip features or deliver bugs.

 

[tgrick]

Take a hard cold look at what Claude or Gemini can do. Ask it to write you an app. Seriously. It's a game changer. What to create a movie? No problem. The software of old is hard. You have meeting about requirement. You have meetings about nice want's and features. You need to reform testing and more testing. Human factors and the list goes on. This new world with AI coding is a game changer! Those of us that code and that have managed programmers and engineers know the frustrations and many weekends and nights. AI has changed the equations completely. It's not the same world. Now you need a person that can manage what to ask the AI agent and it's mins not months.

 

[Thebandit]

Take a hard cold look at what Claude or Gemini can do. Ask it to write you an app. Seriously. It's a game changer. What to create a movie? No problem. The software of old is hard. You have meeting about requirement. You have meetings about nice want's and features. You need to reform testing and more testing. Human factors and the list goes on. This new world with AI coding is a game changer! Those of us that code and that have managed programmers and engineers know the frustrations and many weekends and nights. AI has changed the equations completely. It's not the same world. Now you need a person that can manage what to ask the AI agent and it's mins not months.

Bro just stop. You have no idea what you're talking about.

 

[amo2u]

Ask Lucid Gravity owners how they feel about software quality.

Rivian is holding back features for one simple reason: customer satisfaction. You may be annoyed a feature isn't available yet, but you would be pissed beyond belief if the feature was there and wasn't reliable. Slow and steady might actually win the race.

For "Pet Mode" specifically, this feature cannot fail, EVER. It has to work 100% of the time exactly as intended. If this feature were to malfunction on even a warm day, the consequences would catastrophic, not only for the owner and their pet but for Rivian as a company.

 

[andersonjanette]

Question from a person who has never owned anything EV and is not computer savvy (sorry, don't bash me I'm trying )! Does this mean these features will eventually be there, or is there a way to see if they can activate certain ones upon picking up the R2?

 

[Redline]

Question from a person who has never owned anything EV and is not computer savvy (sorry, don't bash me I'm trying )! Does this mean these features will eventually be there, or is there a way to see if they can activate certain ones upon picking up the R2?

they’ll come in a future update

 

[GMAR]

Writing software is not any more difficult than writing a paragraph. Tying your shoe is also very easy. But, writing a paragraph of instructions on how to tie your shoes - that is not so easy.

 

[Donald Stanfield]

Question from a person who has never owned anything EV and is not computer savvy (sorry, don't bash me I'm trying )! Does this mean these features will eventually be there, or is there a way to see if they can activate certain ones upon picking up the R2?

Yes, they will eventually be there. Rivian is pretty good about adding features on a monthly basis.

 

[JacobAZ]

Question from a person who has never owned anything EV and is not computer savvy (sorry, don't bash me I'm trying )! Does this mean these features will eventually be there, or is there a way to see if they can activate certain ones upon picking up the R2?

Reasonable question. Only Rivian knows for sure. However, high probability it's not something that be activated. Although the software may exist and function in R1, the R2 is different hardware, different user interface, etc. So, the R1 software needs to be modified, and integrated into the R2 components, tested, etc. This takes time. In the interest of getting to market, it's likely Rivian went forward without some non-critiacal functions.

 

[r2fb]

Bro just stop. You have no idea what you're talking about.

Actually as a 20-year software developer AI definitely helps speed up things considerably. The real skill these days is breaking up tasks efficiently to small chunks so AI can do its thing. Testing is what really takes time though and everywhere I've been in, that was what kept things delayed so I assume it's the same in Rivian.

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