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You know how the account, transit, and check numbers along the bottom of a paper check use that weird OCR font? And are printed with magnetic ink? That's what
by function_seven 8y ago
You know how the account, transit, and check numbers along the bottom of a paper check use that weird OCR font? And are printed with magnetic ink?
That's what we should do with road signs and lane markings. Make them resemble the current ones somewhat, but also be optimized for a computer to recognize them even in extreme conditions. Not only with wider differentiation between signs of different types, but also using radio, UV, infrared, or magnetic cues. Lanes could be painted with metallic pigments for example. Even when snow covers the edges of the roadway, the car could read those lines and center itself.
All of this would be a change to what we already do. No need for extra equipment or drastic changes in infrastructure. Just update how existing signs and road markings are made.
- realbarack 8y agoI agree with you that this is a route which deserves investigation. My question is, how difficult is it to make something which works "even in extreme conditions"? I would guess that it's really difficult, particularly when one takes into account deterioration (asphalt needs to be maintained constantly, these things probably would be too) and monitoring. That said, I don't know much about this space so maybe I'm just overestimating the difficulty here.
- voxadam 8y ago> You know how the account, transit, and check numbers along the bottom of a paper check use that weird OCR font? And are printed with magnetic ink? You're talking about MICR (Magnetic Ink Character Recognition) and the E-13B font.