Dear Elon, Why cant we have basic phone texting functions.....

[Altes]

why cant texts be read by the car? and responded to?
why cant we dictate texts?
why is basic voice phone and command recognition so poor?

this is stuff that a $20K honda can do

 

[TexasEV]

Tesla has limited bandwidth and has decided to focus on features that differentiate it from other cars, rather than putting effort into doing what's been done by others. If your priority is a long range EV, buy the Tesla. If your priority is other features, buy the ICE with the other features.

 

[Shock-On-T]

why cant texts be read by the car? and responded to?
why cant we dictate texts?
why is basic voice phone and command recognition so poor?

this is stuff that a $20K honda can do

Apple and Google software is an extension of your phone, Tesla's software is an extension of the car.
From a purely entertainment and connectivity point of view it will be hard competing with those big tech monsters, but Tesla has big plans for its own software such as ridesharing, billing, etc, as well as autonomy, charging, sunroof/door control etc etc.

 

[AmpedRealtor]

Tesla has limited bandwidth and has decided to focus on features that differentiate it from other cars, rather than putting effort into doing what's been done by others. If your priority is a long range EV, buy the Tesla. If your priority is other features, buy the ICE with the other features.

Or wait until Mercedes, BMW, Ford, Volvo, and many others can offer what Tesla can't - all of the features you love and want PLUS the long range EV part. They are coming, less than 3 years away. Once they are here, customers will no longer be faced with such a ludicrous choice.

 

[cab]

How long can Tesla avoid Apple Carplay and Android Auto integration? Indeed, I see the next version of Android Auto allows for much better integration with the manufacturer's own UI (and "skinning" to maintain each manufacturer's look and feel). Today, I don't think AA or AC have a compelling "killer app", but it's just a matter of time. Tick tock, Tesla...tick tock.

 

[bob_p]

The excuse of limited software development resources was reasonable in 2012 & 2013.

And that probably won't be accepted by the many new customers they want to attract for the Model 3.

We have a rental car this weekend - and were surprised when text messages were displayed on the (relatively) small console display - and when the traffic navigation issued verbal warnings about upcoming traffic issues ("traffic jam between exits xx and xx" or "accident ahead").

If Tesla can invest resources in easter eggs like the Model X Christmas light/door show or the notepad app, customers may have a more difficult time understanding why other more useful features aren't available - or why we are still waiting for obvious bugs to be fixed more than six months after 8.0 was released (no XM radio station/categories, multiple USB song player problems, ...).

 

[eye.surgeon]

Tesla has limited bandwidth and has decided to focus on features that differentiate it from other cars, rather than putting effort into doing what's been done by others. If your priority is a long range EV, buy the Tesla. If your priority is other features, buy the ICE with the other features.

How about we decommission the easter egg team and put them on task to drag the UI all the way to 2015 or so. Seriously, it shouldn't be an either/or. Either they're building a world class car or they aren't.

 

[pnd4pnd]

I have to say the lack of any advanced (really normal) capabilities here has me starting to look at other cars where the first few years I never even looked. Tesla better put some effort in this area or they will lose me as a customer.

 

[AmpedRealtor]

The crux of this problem is Elon Musk. All he seems to care about is Autopilot, and even then, seems to be pissing off customers by not delivering on his promises. There doesn't seem to be anyone at Tesla who is paying attention to the non-Autopilot stuff.

 

[Logan5]

One of the things that was teased last year by Tesla if not in a tweet by Elon is screencasting apps from either Android or iOS to the center screen. In fact when I picked up my car last August the service rep said that they were anticipating the feature in six months.

I guess what they were suggesting was sufficiently vague but it wasn't either CarPlay or Android Auto. Rather they seemed to imply that they would be able to get an app to display on the center console as a second screen with no mention of touch control.

I interpreted this to be one of two possibilities. The first most obvious possibility for the technology would be something like AirPlay to the center screen, essentially mirroring the devices screen on the center console.

The second, more speculative and unlikely possibility was that they could get full touch screen support by levaraging the Tesla app and having third party modules supported there. I don't know the type of programming that would be required or how feasible it would be but the way I imagine this working is that you launch the Tesla app on the phone and this app funnels plugin data from the phone to touch screen. This would be a workaround for the lack of such support in Android and iOS, and like I said it's unlikely.

 

[bob_p]

In the next several years, Tesla will see competitors release comparable long range EVs, at prices similar to Tesla.

While Tesla may introduce FSD first (because of Tesla's quick over-the-air update process), other vendors will also have their own FSD.

And while Tesla has a huge advantage with the Supercharger network, it's likely there will be an alternative network established at some point that supports the other manufacturers.

This means in several years, Tesla's current differentiators may disappear. At that point, Tesla's non-AP software could become a differentiator for purchase decisions - and unless Tesla does more to provide more functionality - and to improve the quality of the software releases, Tesla could be at greater risk in losing sales to other manufacturers.

We've rented ICEs at much lower price points than our S 100D and S P85 - and those cars have had better smartphone integration, and the car we rented last weekend had real-time traffic notifications (accident or traffic jam ahead between exits xxx and xxx).

If Musk wants to maintain Tesla as a "prestige" brand (when there are serious EV competitors), they really should take a hard look at their non-AP software - establish a goal to bring their software to at least a level comparable to other manufacturers, and, even better, to establish a goal of being the market leader.

Since the Model S was introduced, we've had a stream of missed promises - we still don't have features promised for the first Model S cars - like a WiFi hotspot (which would never have made much sense with 3G anyway), on-board music storage (which was part of the premium audio upgrade), and a Tesla App Store. Since then, Musk's talked about items like increased user interface customization, the operating system upgrade (which may be getting close), improved browser (also late - but could be coming soon), 3rd party app development (promised, but appears to have disappeared from their roadmap), and smartphone screen sharing (Apple CarPlay, Android Auto, or alternative). Plus, the media player & navigation software lack obvious features (playlists, shuffle mode that is actually random, restoring the last played USB song after changing media source, waypoints, route customization, ...).

As a longtime Tesla customer - with two Model S today and two Model 3's reserved, if another manufacturer offered a similar EV, the onboard software could be a factor in converting our Model 3 reservations to orders. And if that's true for a longtime Tesla customer, Tesla should be concerned about the new customers they'll need to attract...

 

[CuriousG]

Why reinvent the wheel? Can't all this be done by saying "Hey Siri, read my text messages" or "Ok Google, send a text message to Elon Musk"? I find the voice recognition on the Tesla to be slow when I do need to use it.

 

[jelloslug]

Or wait until Mercedes, BMW, Ford, Volvo, and many others can offer what Tesla can't - all of the features you love and want PLUS the long range EV part. They are coming, less than 3 years away. Once they are here, customers will no longer be faced with such a ludicrous choice.

Their cars are perpetually "just around the corner".

 

[Saghost]

I've read that both Android Auto and Apple Carplay rely on a specific chip in the car's stereo to do the interface, which Tesla doesn't seem to have.

Presumably they could emulate it if they have enough processor time and aren't bound by law, but I suspect that's the reason they are talking about a unique solution instead of having already implemented Carplay.

For the last six-eight months, most of Tesla's resources have been tied up in solving the mess they got into with Mobileye - getting AP2 functional at close to AP1.

I'm hoping that in the next six months we'll see a lot more general software development instead

 

[mkspeedr]

Why reinvent the wheel? Can't all this be done by saying "Hey Siri, read my text messages" or "Ok Google, send a text message to Elon Musk"? I find the voice recognition on the Tesla to be slow when I do need to use it.

I totally agree with this. Focus on the important features of the car and leave the software to the software people. I might be the last person in the world using a windows phone but Cortana works awesome on my model S. It works so good - apple and android people always comment in my car, "wow, that is better than my phone/car."

 

[AmpedRealtor]

Why reinvent the wheel? Can't all this be done by saying "Hey Siri, read my text messages" or "Ok Google, send a text message to Elon Musk"? I find the voice recognition on the Tesla to be slow when I do need to use it.

How, pray tell, do you think your suggestion would work for deaf people or anyone with an accent? Seriously, think beyond yourself for a moment.

 

[AmpedRealtor]

Their cars are perpetually "just around the corner".

The corner is fast approaching.

 

[mkspeedr]

How, pray tell, do you think your suggestion would work for deaf people or anyone with an accent? Seriously, think beyond yourself for a moment.

I have no experience with deaf drivers but I have extensive experience with many different accents. Cortana is very good at working with accents and has no issues with my wife's heavy accent.

 

[Whistle2Whine]

I actually was going to start a thread on this very subject: I'm on a business trip right now and the Chevy Impala they gave me has Android Auto+CarPlay. I'm VERY impressed, with built in "OK Google" integration, SPOTIFY control and text dictation. Tesla needs to step it up. I'm looking to replace our ICE car with something fun but luxurious but smaller than our P90DL, and the lack of real software updates is becoming more of a problem, because the Android Auto navigation is honestly better than what's in my S. I'm hoping they've been holding the good stuff back to coincide with the Model3 release?

And to the poster that mentioned the damned easter eggs...what he/she said. Seriously, I have a phone, Kindle HD and Surface Pro4...the LAST place I need to be drawing on a screen is in my car. That dev effort could have gone toward some apps.

 

[PluggedINLife]

why cant texts be read by the car? and responded to?
why cant we dictate texts?
why is basic voice phone and command recognition so poor?

this is stuff that a $20K honda can do

I would love to see this as well. My wife's Lexus RX350 has the capability. When a text comes in the display will show the text and also read it out if needed which I think is pretty cool especially since you can't be holding your mobile device in CA while driving or you can get a ticket.