This reminds me of a Top Gear where they were skewing a Ferrari (the 458 maybe?) for its F1-inspired wheel that had the same problem where all its functions were on the wheel making them dangerous to use at speed.
Something like this, which isn’t far off from the Tesla’s wheel actually:
This also came out some 15 years ago, so it’s not like these problems weren’t known or obvious.
I mean yeah actual F1 wheels have tons of buttons and stuff on them, but they are also driven by highly skilled and trained professional drivers and customized specifically to the driver’s requirements.
But also, look at that wheel: all the buttons are tactile: you can feel the edges of them, and there’s almost certainly a resistance and click when they’re activated. One of them is rotational, and there is certainly both a directional aspect, so you can tell what it’s set to by feel, and there’ll be a click-click as you change settings. The indicators are on the wheel (not great, especially when turning), but at least you don’t have to do spatial calculus to figure out which one to press even when driving straight down the road at a reasonable speed.
Touch screens and touch buttons in cars is almost never the correct option, and even when a touchscreen is appropriate (such as a GPS), some functions absolutely need tactile buttons and knobs as the primary interface. (Yes, that includes volume and climate control.)
Agreed. I forgot that the Tesla used capacitive touch buttons which is just WTF.
I recently got a new car and a lot of it is touch based now. Even for being touch-oriented, it does have really well designed climate controls. It also has stunningly good voice controls that can do most everything with minimal cognitive load (which is a big change for me as in every other car I’ve driven the voice commands are more often than not more dangerous than just hitting a button because they are so damn finicky). There are still some minimalist physical control surfaces as well so I don’t often find myself reaching for or looking at the touch screen while driving for more than a brief moment.
If nothing else it shows that it is possible to be touch/voice oriented without losing too much in the ergonomics department, but it was a steep learning curve.
I’m happier with it in my car than I thought I’d be after learning how to use it, but as a whole I’m definitely not entirely sold on this non-tactile direction that many automakers are going with.
My brain and its unpredictably selective mutism (especially when under stress or concentrating) mean that voice controls are the worst possible option. When they are available, and when it’s possible to do so, I always turn them off. Also: D/deaf people drive.
Wow. The F-35 started development in 1995, almost 30 years ago. That’s long enough for some of the fresh-out-of-school engineers who started out their careers working on that project to be thinking about early retirement and the thing isn’t even done yet.
