Touchscreen buttons are an anomaly?

[kenyee]

https://techcrunch.com/2024/10/30/rivians-chief-software-officer-says-in-car-buttons-are-an-anomaly/

https://techcrunch.com/video/how-to-build-tech-that-wins-over-customers-with-rivian-wassym-bensaid/

Interesting take... Especially with Alexa being horrible ?

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[bfilippo]

Well, here’s hoping this gets…better

 

[NY_Rob]

He's the head of Software, of course he thinks touchscreens are better than physical buttons. Imagine if he had said "I prefer physical buttons and knobs over touchscreens"? ?

 

[ThirteenElectrics]

Wassym is not an expert in human interaction design. Or cars, for that matter. From what I can tell, he is an expert in bugs. The reason buttons exist is so you can feel them without taking your eyes off the road. It is a safety issue. Voice doesn’t work in a noisy car with a bunch of kids, either yelling or sleeping in the back. Sometimes you want silence, not “turn on the second row driver side heater to level two.”

 

[Oldsmobile_Mike]

Haven't watched the videos but I agree with the premise - would much rather control my car with my voice. Shame, as was already mentioned, Alexa is horrible. ?

 

[Spaceball1]

I know this is beat to death on this forum, but why do people still believe this myth:

“CarPlay “takes over all the pixels in the screen, and it’s a replacement of the entire experience…”

There’s nothing about CarPlay that forces you to use a full screen. It could (and is in some vehicles) just be a portion of a screen, or just an app in Rivian/Tesla’s case. Works like this on our Kia and even my old Jeep GC still had buttons for heated/cooled seats and outside temp showing around the CarPlay interface.

Adding CarPlay isn’t “lazy”, it’s efficient design and what many consumers still want. He and others like him just want to justify their jobs in over complicating the built-in software of their trucks.

It’s a shame, really, and as a stockholder and customer I feel they are wasting so much time and money on the infotainment side of their UI. They will never be able to fully integrate with our phones, particularly with text message handling, like CP and AA can. Tesla has tried and it’s awful due to the severe limitations of doing it over BT.

 

[Zoidz]

I know this is beat to death on this forum, but why do people still believe this myth:

“CarPlay “takes over all the pixels in the screen, and it’s a replacement of the entire experience…”

There’s nothing about CarPlay that forces you to use a full screen. It could (and is in some vehicles) just be a portion of a screen, or just an app in Rivian/Tesla’s case. Works like this on our Kia and even my old Jeep GC still had buttons for heated/cooled seats and outside temp showing around the CarPlay interface.

Adding CarPlay isn’t “lazy”, it’s efficient design and what many consumers still want. He and others like him just want to justify their jobs in over complicating the built-in software of their trucks.

It’s a shame, really, and as a stockholder and customer I feel they are wasting so much time and money on the infotainment side of their UI. They will never be able to fully integrate with our phones, particularly with text message handling, like CP and AA can. Tesla has tried and it’s awful due to the severe limitations of doing it over BT.

He's likely referring to Next Generation CarPlay, which by design is intended to take over all the pixels and screens. It provides an OEM toolkit for the entire vehicle UI - gauges, climate control, etc. AFAIK, it has yet to be released in any production vehicle so no end consumers can comment on how it works.

 

[SwampNut]

I know this is beat to death on this forum, but why do people still believe this myth:

“CarPlay “takes over all the pixels in the screen, and it’s a replacement of the entire experience…”

Because liars like Musk and Scaringe keep claiming it.

 

[kenyee]

> Haven't watched the videos

The video was a good background watch...a bit more insight into how Rivian is thinking about UX and being uniquely Rivian.
Mildly curious how VW's UI is going to look out of this. Seems like they're competing with Android Auto and Carplay at some point with at least Google providing APIs for building UI blocks for automakers to customize Android Auto. Rivian's goal is definitely to sell to other OEMs according to the interview.

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