Enhanced Summon, where are you?

[AlanSubie4Life]

My metric for not sucking is that Enhanced Summon should be able to move from A to B within 150 ft in a parking lot at a reasonable speed and without hitting anything.

That seems like a really low bar (though it appears too high for the current implementation). What about obstructing other traffic and obeying general parking lot conventions? You make it sound like you are very conservative on the rollout of Summon, but with the metric you describe, you seem quite aggressive. It's just way too simplistic, I feel.

Are you sure you don't want to flesh out your requirements a bit more?

without hitting anything.

You need to assign a percentage to this event. It's definitely going to hit things, ~100% likelihood over the fleet, when it is released, even if it doesn't suck. And how much of the burden is on the user for Summon not hitting things? I mean, I know it has to be monitored. But it's kind of hard to react quickly remotely, if you've ever tried to fly a RC helicopter or drive an RC car.

Is the car going to honk at people who start backing out when they shouldn't? (I can see such a feature would have high comedic value if it were overly sensitive.) Will it take evasive actions like a human driver?

 

[Matias]

What about obstructing other traffic

My guess is that this will be real problem. It is relatively easy to make car very conservative in order to not to hit anything, but the trade off is, that car will not dare to move. I believe this will cause gridlocks in parking lots.

 

[diplomat33]

That seems like a really low bar (though it appears too high for the current implementation). What about obstructing other traffic and obeying general parking lot conventions? You make it sound like you are very conservative on the rollout of Summon, but with that metric alone, you seem quite aggressive. It's just way too simplistic, I feel.

Are you sure you don't want to flesh out your requirements a bit more?

Actually, I am lowering the bar precisely because I think it is more realistic for Tesla to achieve this year. I think Tesla can achieve my bar this year. Your metrics are great for a L5 feature but Tesla is unlikely to achieve that this year.

Eventually, yes, I want enhanced summon to be L5 since L5 enhanced summon is a component of true FSD. But that ain't going to happen this year. So I think for an initial release, I would be happy if enhanced summon just let me move my car around a parking lot remotely with my supervision. That seems to be what Tesla is aiming for anyway at least as an initial release.

Remember that Tesla takes an incremental approach, releasing features with driver supervision first and then validating them towards eventually being L3+. So Tesla will most likely release enhanced summon with driver supervision first and then use data to improve it until it does not need driver supervision anymore. This first version of enhanced summon is just an incremental step towards FSD.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

Actually, I am lowering the bar precisely because I think it is more realistic for Tesla to achieve this year. I think Tesla can achieve my bar this year.

But what would the significance of this achievement be?

This first version of enhanced summon is just an incremental step towards FSD.

It doesn't seem like an incremental step if it doesn't solve any of the difficult problems.

Not to mention it's going to be an embarrassment if these things are not solved. I'm not even sure that what I've described would be level 5, since I'm saying I want it to do these things with driver supervision - I'm actually ok with the line of sight thing as long as it is REALLY good at doing the right thing. That alone would be very impressive if it accomplishes most tasks and drives the right way with constant monitoring. But what you are describing is not this.

 

[Az_Rael]

The more I think about it, a Costco parking lot is a perfect stress test for enhanced summon and should be their goal.

Lots of traffic up and down the aisles as people search for open spots, you have people with poor SA (situational awareness) rumbling along on random pathways pushing large carts. Lots of running children as well. There are the gas station lines overflowing into traffic lanes, there are the large unconventional vehicles lined up at the propane station (RVs and trailers), there are the tire shop guys driving cars into and out of the tire bays at high rates of speed. Plus the car wash exit with folks in a hurry to get out of the way before the car on the track behind them rear ends them. Oh, and my favorite: 4 people backing out of nearby spaces all at once while someone is waiting in the aisle for a spot and no one can figure out how to unjam the logjam that was just created and no one is giving any ground.

Maybe it is just my Costco that is like this, but if enhanced summon can solve it, Tesla will have a mint on their hands.

 

[EVNow]

What is your feeling on when it should be released?

What is your MVP ?

Your list is all over the place - it has metrics, features, edge cases.

 

[EVNow]

This one really made me laugh when he posted it. It reminded me of the President saying "no one knew healthcare could be so complicated". No, everyone knew healthcare is hard, that is why we have been arguing about it for decades.

Maybe Elon never drives in retail parking lots anymore? So he honestly didnt know how hard of a problem the average Costco parking lot is?

Actually not many talk about parking lots as a hard problem. Waymo ceo said the same thing.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

What is your MVP ?

Your list is all over the place - it has metrics, features, edge cases.

Yep. It is. Just kind of a list I threw together thinking about it. Seems like all of the above is important! As I said, it is not intended to be an exhaustive list!

I'm not sure that I can take the time right now to flesh out my minimum viable product. As I said earlier, I'll know it when I see it. Good enough for me.

 

[EVNow]

. As I said earlier, I'll know it when I see it. Good enough for me

Exactly. So, Tesla will release what they think is MVP, we all get to vote. Trying to boil the ocean never helped release any product.

 

[Daniel in SD]

Actually not many talk about parking as a hard problem. Waymo ceo said the same thing.

My informal curb rash survey says that it's a hard problem for most Tesla drivers.
I am hoping that all this work on Enhanced Summon will at least make auto park work well.

 

[Az_Rael]

Actually not many talk about parking as a hard problem. Waymo ceo said the same thing.

Which is stil odd to me. Maybe CEOs in general don't drive in parking lots much? They should poll soccer moms or something.

Although to be honest, parking lots were only at "nornal mode" where I used to live since real estate was cheap (lots were large with big aisles for pickup trucks). Only the Target and Costco had gauntlets to navigate. Only once I moved to CA did I have to go to "deathmatch mode" in most parking lots. Real estate is expensive here, so parking lots trend too small with tight aisles.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

Maybe it is just my Costco that is like this,

Your Costco looks like a walk in the park! Look at those nice wide spots with double wide painting between them! In Palmdale, land is plentiful!

Google Maps

Check out this Costco; I personally think it's the worst one in San Diego - though I haven't been to all of them.

Google Maps

I think having Enhanced Summon work reliably in such a Costco parking lot would be a huge achievement. Probably doesn't cover all the cases but it certainly would be impressive.

 

[timewasted]

That new enhanced summon video looks like utter garbage. The guy is super pumped that it can be "confident" in moving in a straight line backwards. It then weaves all around trying to guess where it needs to go, before it confidently double parks itself. It's OK though, since it'll be fixed in <current version +1>! Welcome to the new low bar for expectations!

Meanwhile another lead in the Autopilot department leaving is somehow Good For Tesla™. One less barnacle impeding Lord Elon's progress, probably.

I sincerely miss the days when @wk057, @verygreen, @jimmy_d, and even @Bladerskb kept the Tesla hype machine grounded in reality by providing real data instead of fetishizing every word from the good book of Elon.

 

[EVNow]

I sincerely miss the days when @wk057, @verygreen, @jimmy_d, and even @Bladerskb kept the Tesla hype machine grounded in reality by providing real data instead of fetishizing every word from the good book of Elon.

Oh yes, shorts, people who work for competitors and their friends always give accurate information.

 

[EVNow]

I think having Enhanced Summon work reliably in such a Costco parking lot would be a huge achievement. Probably doesn't cover all the cases but it certainly would be impressive.

Also the reason that won't happen in the first release. Crawl, walk and then run.

Whatever Musk might think, the first version is not going to blow our minds (might impress someone who's totally new to AP).

 

[jebinc]

That new enhanced summon video looks like utter garbage. The guy is super pumped that it can be "confident" in moving in a straight line backwards. It then weaves all around trying to guess where it needs to go, before it confidently double parks itself. It's OK though, since it'll be fixed in <current version +1>! Welcome to the new low bar for expectations!

Meanwhile another lead in the Autopilot department leaving is somehow Good For Tesla™. One less barnacle impeding Lord Elon's progress, probably.

I sincerely miss the days when @wk057, @verygreen, @jimmy_d, and even @Bladerskb kept the Tesla hype machine grounded in reality by providing real data instead of fetishizing every word from the good book of Elon.

+1 For these reasons your "Lord Elon" is known in this household (and friend group) as "The Charlatan". Don't get me wrong, we need visionaries and folks to promote progress, and to get others out of their comfort zones - no issue. I have issue with the publicly traded company promoting the same mentality and misinformation (see earlier FSD order page post(s)) - Kinda feels like a "Sham-wow" infomercial...

 

[S4WRXTTCS]

I wonder why he quit? Perhaps he felt the boss lost confidence in him (based on the recent and very public "sucks" comments from said boss) - and felt working tirelessly 20 hours a day (or whatever more than eight), and getting indirectly criticized (and publicly) by the boss, left him feeling like it was best to move on (for health and/or other reasons). Tough to be an effective leader in that kind of environment. No one really wants to work in a hostile work environment anyway (right?); so if he did leave under his own power, that's good for him.

It's impossible to say.

The enhanced summons was an impossible task to begin with.

It's absolutely the most challenging environment to deal with while also not having the right sensors for the job. How are you ever supposed to get that to not suck? Saying "it almost doesn't suck" is paying it the highest complement.

Then there is the auto-lane change. Lets say he did a good job as the lead getting his part of it working. It took a bunch of updates, but it seems to be working well. But, it doesn't matter cause to most people it sucks. Why does it suck? Because NoA is ridiculously dumb.

Like I was testing it last time at 2:30am, and at the time of night you'd expect traffic to be light enough so NoA would work well. But, it failed. Why did it fail? Cause it didn't get into the exit lane soon enough, and instead had to ask "permission" by blinking on it's turn signal to ask despite having PLENTY of opportunity to get over before hand.

I imagine working at Tesla can be both hugely rewarding as they can bring to market things quickly, but it can also really suck because things don't quite come together.

TACC could be totally smooth, but isn't because they try to do too much with it
AP could work a lot better if they'd solve a few nagging issues. Like how it re-centers when a lane widens due to a lane merging in. So it looks idiotic as it goes all the way to the right.
NoA would be a lot better with more conditional coding. Like for example the other night it decided to pass on the right. I had the setting to average so it shouldn't have done that. It's a little weird to have a system that's been passing on the passing lane to the left for hundreds of miles suddenly decide on the wrong lane. I didn't even check that lane, and as soon as I felt it I stopped it. I have no idea what message it showed as tesla doesn't save notifications anywhere.

I imagine all the frustrations I have are quadruped with anyone that works at Tesla.

There is always going to be frustrations with getting computers/humans to work together, but at least Cruise will give him what he needs to do the job.

 

[S4WRXTTCS]

That new enhanced summon video looks like utter garbage. The guy is super pumped that it can be "confident" in moving in a straight line backwards. It then weaves all around trying to guess where it needs to go, before it confidently double parks itself. It's OK though, since it'll be fixed in <current version +1>! Welcome to the new low bar for expectations!

The problem with videos like that is they spend so much time self promoting. It's pretty clear when halfway through the video he spends a bunch of time to REMIND people to subscribe. Owners like him tend to brush over some pretty major issues with their desperation for more and more referrals, likes, etc.

The way I see it is Enhanced summons is a way to get your car to come pick you up. It won't take the best route, and it certainly won't be pretty. It's simply adding vision to a system that is currently 100% reliant on vision.

Will it get better over time? Yes, but not for the reasons mentioned in the video.

What Elon/Tesla is trying to do is to release SOMETHING to make room for HW3.

What should the bar be on a SW release for obsolete HW? I think Elon is setting the expectation low because they don't really care about HW2/HW2.5 anymore.

If you really looked into how various systems on the market work you'll see that a lot of them work because they set the bar low, and the requirements of the system low.

Take the Audi A8 with L3 mode for example. It sets the bar low by only working at slow speeds, and not only that it only works when you're basically boxed in with other cars. Can anyone think of a lower low bar?

Sometimes it's even important to set a low bar.

For example TACC used to work when the bar was set low.

Now it's just this annoying herky, jerky thing that freaks out anytime a car ahead even gets close to the line. I wish they had a setting to control how skittish you wanted TACC to be.

 

[jebinc]

Navigation Failed

WOW!

 

[willow_hiller]

Navigation Failed

WOW!

Glitches happen. This sounds a lot like the bug triggered by a full USB drive. And the OP there was in no danger as long as they paid attention to the road, as is required by AP at the moment. Not really relevant to the enhanced summon thread.