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Rivian consistently ships a lot of new features and improvements, you can see the changelogs here [1]. I think you can pretty fairly critique a lot of them with

Rivian consistently ships a lot of new features and improvements, you can see the changelogs here [1]. I think you can pretty fairly critique a lot of them with: They are just solving a problem that they created by making it too techy, or they are shipping stuff they should have completed before releasing the product. I do think its hard to argue that the updates aren't adding anything of value though. There's convenience stuff like pet mode or bird's eye camera view that were added after release, but there are also things like new driving modes (soft sand and snow) or improved DC charging curves and smarter battery conditioning that legitimately improve the quality of the product as a vehicle. > Edit: Also, why the heck isn't the entertainment system completely air gapped from the software running the car? As for this, the entertainment system can control basically every feature of the car and is often the primary or only way to accomplish certain things. Even in much much dumber cars the infotainment is still part of the CAN bus and is able to interact with the rest of the vehicle. https://rivian.software/category/public/ https://rivian.software/category/public/

hef19898 3y ago
Funny, our 2020 MY Jaguar controls car functions from the digital screen in front of the driver, the middle console screens only control AC, entertainment, phone, navigation and other non-car related stuff. No idea how the architecture looks behind all that so. But seriously, even if on the same bus, just don't the media player, radio and connected phone access to the systems actually running the car from engine to brakes. And please, please, finish developing the embedded software running on car before shipping said car. Then it can be air gapped, if not it requires OTA and internet access, raising all kinds of security issues...
- CamperBob2 3y ago
  And please, please, finish developing the embedded software running on car before shipping said car. Sorry, but things no longer work that way, and never will again. This is a good thing, as long as processes are improved to avoid situations like this one.
  - lotsoweiners 3y ago
    > This is a good thing, as long as processes are improved to avoid situations like this one. How do you figure. I can’t think of a single thing in my vehicle that could be improved by software. When I buy a car I’d prefer it was done.
    - LoganDark 3y ago
      It's supposedly a good thing because more features can be added over time, but if they were features worth adding in the first place, the car should have shipped with them already.
      - hef19898 3y ago
        That is the big difference between hardware and software engineering: Once hardware is shipped, there is nothing you can do besides repaurs and retrofits requiring a workshop. Software can updated and changed today anytime. My biggest issue with modern cars, and it seems this is spreading to other embedded systems than cars, is treating those as software: connect them to the web and run OTA updates everytime you need to fix a bug. That requires some form of inzernet cinnection, which requires regular security updates, which require OTA update capability. All that because, bluntly, software devs cannot be bothered with just finishing software running on non-connected hardware that just works, not can they be bothered following hardware development in case hardware is the main component, as in cars. And no, no car manufacturer is a software company, nor phone maker like Apple. The proper way of fixing software bigs in automotive used to be, again thank you Tesla for breaking something that just worked, to recall the affected cars to a workshop to conduct the software update. Honestly, the only thing on a car that should be updated by the owner is maps for the GPS unit.
  - jacquesm 3y ago
    Things work like that just fine: buy an old car and call it a day. The less software in my car the better.

hef19898 3y ago

Funny, our 2020 MY Jaguar controls car functions from the digital screen in front of the driver, the middle console screens only control AC, entertainment, phone, navigation and other non-car related stuff. No idea how the architecture looks behind all that so. But seriously, even if on the same bus, just don't the media player, radio and connected phone access to the systems actually running the car from engine to brakes. And please, please, finish developing the embedded software running on car before shipping said car. Then it can be air gapped, if not it requires OTA and internet access, raising all kinds of security issues...

CamperBob2 3y ago
And please, please, finish developing the embedded software running on car before shipping said car. Sorry, but things no longer work that way, and never will again. This is a good thing, as long as processes are improved to avoid situations like this one.
- lotsoweiners 3y ago
  > This is a good thing, as long as processes are improved to avoid situations like this one. How do you figure. I can’t think of a single thing in my vehicle that could be improved by software. When I buy a car I’d prefer it was done.
  - LoganDark 3y ago
    It's supposedly a good thing because more features can be added over time, but if they were features worth adding in the first place, the car should have shipped with them already.
    - hef19898 3y ago
      That is the big difference between hardware and software engineering: Once hardware is shipped, there is nothing you can do besides repaurs and retrofits requiring a workshop. Software can updated and changed today anytime. My biggest issue with modern cars, and it seems this is spreading to other embedded systems than cars, is treating those as software: connect them to the web and run OTA updates everytime you need to fix a bug. That requires some form of inzernet cinnection, which requires regular security updates, which require OTA update capability. All that because, bluntly, software devs cannot be bothered with just finishing software running on non-connected hardware that just works, not can they be bothered following hardware development in case hardware is the main component, as in cars. And no, no car manufacturer is a software company, nor phone maker like Apple. The proper way of fixing software bigs in automotive used to be, again thank you Tesla for breaking something that just worked, to recall the affected cars to a workshop to conduct the software update. Honestly, the only thing on a car that should be updated by the owner is maps for the GPS unit.
- jacquesm 3y ago
  Things work like that just fine: buy an old car and call it a day. The less software in my car the better.