Blog Musk Touts ‘Quantum Leap” in Full Self-Driving Performance

A “quantum leap” improvement is coming to Tesla’s Autopilot software in six to 10 weeks, Chief Executive Elon Musk said a tweet.

Musk called the new software a “fundamental architectural rewrite, not an incremental tweak.”

https://twitter.com/x/status/1294374864657162240

Musk said his personal car is running a “bleeding edge alpha build” of the software, which he also mentioned during Tesla’s Q2 earnings. 

“So it’s almost getting to the point where I can go from my house to work with no interventions, despite going through construction and widely varying situations,” Musk said on the earnings call. “So this is why I am very confident about full self-driving functionality being complete by the end of this year, is because I’m literally driving it.”

Tesla’s Full Self-Driving software has been slow to roll out against the company’s promises. Musk previously said a Tesla would drive from Los Angeles to New York using the Full Self Driving feature by the end of 2019. The company didn’t meet that goal. So, it will be interesting to see the state of Autopilot at the end of 2020.

 

[diplomat33]

According to a reliable source, an early version of the "FSD rewrite" is now in shadow mode in 2020.36. "Major stuff" should come in 1-2 months:

SatinGreyTesla
"Deleted all my comments below as I have a feeling this will blow up. u/110110 is correct. This is an early version of the rewrite. I don’t like to speculate but I will say since this update is public release and didn’t go to early access program. Everything new is running in shadow mode. Nothing major yet. Major stuff in 1-2 months. Leaning towards 1, saying 2 to be safe. Here is the speed limit sign visualization for those interested! Imgur"

2020.36 Release Notes includes Green Traffic Light Chime and Speed Limit Sign Recognition!! : teslamotors

 

[powertoold]

Exciting times for FSD owners. Downloading my 36 right now. Definitely a wide release.

 

[goRt]

Yes, LiDAR in iPad Pros and coming to iPhone 12 is ‘niche’ LOL. Tossing out an entire kind of technology out of hand is akin to ‘there’s a worldwide market for 5 computers’ (Watson, 1943) or ‘people will get tired of staring at TVs’ (Zanuck, 1946). The human brain receives, analyzes and interprets vastly different kinds of input in order to make it possible for you to walk through a doorway without banging into it (unless you are 13). Sound, light, heat, smell, vibration (low frequency sounds, technically), etc.

Dismissing LiDAR is like saying, ‘I don’t need to hear to be able to navigate my living room’ until the power goes out on a moonless night, then it’s a whole different ballgame. Laser rangefinders were big and expensive when they first came out. Now, like cellphones, they are small and cheap (unless you are getting a smartphone).

IMNSHO, I think it might be more appropriate to say something on the order of, ‘LiDAR is too [expensive | immature] at this time and we’ll continue to evaluate it in the future and when it makes sense, we may include it.’

I stand by my comment - the *current* presented cases are niche.

 

[powertoold]

36, there's not much changed with traffic control feature. There's still a light where it stops well below the line since the line is slanted and there's a right turn island adjacent to the lane.

I did see it recognized some speed limits at night. Otherwise, the green light chime is almost instant.

Apparently all those leakers are bs or got the wrong info:
https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1299957148009394176?s=20

 

[Knightshade]

People grossly, grossly, overestimate and misunderstand what "shadow" mode even is

 

[diplomat33]

Apparently all those leakers are bs or got the wrong info:
https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1299957148009394176?s=20
View attachment 582367

Interestingly, SatinGreyTesla has reponded to Elon's denial. He claims 3 people on the AP team told him that the rewrite was in shadow mode and that Elon is denying it because he does not want people to know the rewrite is being tested.

 

[powertoold]

That doesn't make much sense. Elon's been testing it. He's been talking about it. He's said 8-10 weeks or whatever. It wouldn't be surprising if it was being tested in our cars somehow, yet he denies Omar's tweet.

Honestly, this Satingray guy seems fishy to me. But then again, just my bs'dar going off.

 

[DanCar]

Perhaps part of the rewrite are in shadow mode, that would make both right and wrong.

 

[powertoold]

Perhaps part of the rewrite are in shadow mode, that would make both right and wrong.

I know, but for Elon to reply and deny something on a technicality without the eye emoji?!?

 

[svusa]

I doubt if Tesla can achieve level 4 autonomy anytime soon. My guess is 3-5 years based on past track record. by that time, earlier tesla adopters car will be like a dinosaur

 

[mikes_fsd]

I doubt if Tesla can achieve level 4 autonomy anytime soon. My guess is 3-5 years

3-5 years is my estimate and I'm considered super-optimistic on these boards.

I guess we need to define what is "anytime soon" because for me 3-5 years is an acceptable timeline. My daughter would be eligible for a drivers permit in 5 years.

 

[diplomat33]

I guess we need to define what is "anytime soon" because for me 3-5 years is an acceptable timeline. My daughter would be eligible for drivers permit in 5 years.

Yes we should define what we mean. Personally, I don't consider "3-5 years" to be "anytime soon". For me "anytime soon" is "less than 1 year".

 

[mikes_fsd]

Yes we should define what we mean. Personally, I don't consider "3-5 years" to be "anytime soon". For me "anytime soon" is "less than 1 year".

For L4???

I mean, I thought we were reasonable / logical people here...

In the next year you will see a lot of changes, the re-write, city related driving, but you will not be anywhere near L4, as all of that will require to be supervised by the driver a la L2 requirements, even though the functionality might "feel" like it is L3+ capable, the implementation will be strictly L2 (supervised with responsibility on the driver).

I believe I've made this point multiple times on these forums, it is "the Tesla way" to keep releasing incremental changes to get validated by end users (us the owners).
That validation - back and forth - takes time.

 

[diplomat33]

For L4???

I mean, I thought we were reasonable / logical people here...

In the next year you will see a lot of changes, the re-write, city related driving, but you will not be anywhere near L4, as all of that will require to be supervised by the driver a la L2 requirements, even though the functionality might "feel" like it is L3+ capable, the implementation will be strictly L2 (supervised with responsibility on the driver).

I believe I've made this point multiple times on these forums, it is "the Tesla way" to keep releasing incremental changes to get validated by end users (us the owners).

You misunderstand. I am just saying I define "any time soon" as "less than 1 year".

So, will Tesla achieve L4 "any time soon" ("less than a year")? No. I do not think Tesla will achieve L4 in less than a year. So I agree with you that we will not see L4 in the next year.

Will Tesla achieve L4 in 3-5 years? Maybe, but that is not "any time soon" in my definition.

 

[svusa]

For L4???

I mean, I thought we were reasonable / logical people here...

I

I agree with your point somewhat, my logical brain tells me that problem is a lot harder to decode than what originally thought. Technology doesn't exist at a scale where we can achieve a true level 4. Maybe DARPA has something under their wraps but we don't know it until we see it. My only problem is Elon sold me - what is called Full Self Driving when technology was far from being ready. Autopilot is nowhere close to being FSD and true FSD (without steering wheels) may not arrive for a few more decades. If by then human figures it out how to develop cost-effective and quite air-taxies, FSD is dead on the roads.

 

[diplomat33]

Technology doesn't exist at a scale where we can achieve a true level 4.

I disagree with that. Companies like Waymo, Cruise, Mobileye, Aurora, Aptiv, Yandex, Baidu, and others, all have L4 autonomous driving to various degrees of sophistication. And Waymo did a L4 drive in a car with no steering wheel and pedals back in 2015. So we have the technology to do L4 at scale. It is just a matter of getting the software right and then we will be able to deploy L4 cars with no steering wheel or pedals to scale.

Now L5 is a different matter. L5 is orders of magnitude harder than L4 because it needs to work anywhere, anytime. We are still years away from L5.

 

[svusa]

I And Waymo did a L4 drive in a car with no steering wheel and pedals back in 2015. So we have the technology to do L4 at scale. It is just a matter of getting the software right and then we will be able to deploy L4 cars with no steering wheel or pedals to scale.
from L5.

the reason I said that as far as I know, Waymo struggled with left turns to enter and exist streets/parking lots without traffic lights. That's the problem you can't solve with algo or current set of sensors otherwise we would have FSD on roads by now. It is next to impossible to code for every possibility, day system is that intelligent humans are absolute.

 

[diplomat33]

the reason I said that as far as I know, Waymo struggled with left turns to enter and exist streets/parking lots without traffic lights. That's the problem you can't solve with algo or current set of sensors otherwise we would have FSD on roads by now. It is next to impossible to code for every possibility, day system is that intelligent humans are absolute.

The sensors on Waymo are fine for this problem. It was never a hardware problem. It was a planning and driving policy problem. The car could easily do the maneuver but timing it right, when traffic is very busy, was tricky. The Waymo car would wait for a gap in traffic before making the turn, and would sit there too long, unsure of when the gap was safe enough to make the turn. So the safety driver would take over. But I suspect Waymo has probably managed to figure that out now. They just needed to improve the planning and driving policy to know when a gap in traffic is safe enough to make the turn.

But you are right that it is hard to train a FSD car to handle every single possibility. That's why L5 is still years away. Again, the problem is not hardware. The problem is getting the software to handle every possible case reliably.

 

[mikes_fsd]

Now L5 is a different matter. L5 is orders of magnitude harder than L4 because it needs to work anywhere, anytime. We are still years away from L5.

No, L5 for Waymo is orders of magnitude harder than L4 because of their choice of implementation.
L5 for Tesla will be much easier to achieve - comparatively - because their L4 (L3 even) will be available to millions of people around the world providing feedback on each iteration of the NN tweaks that are released.
Tesla chose to tackle the harder problem, without the crutches, first!
My bet - and it seems theirs as well - is that the payoff is going to be worth it.

What that meant, in the short term, is delays of functionality releases.

That's the problem you can't solve with algo or current set of sensors otherwise we would have FSD on roads by now. It is next to impossible to code for every possibility, day system is that intelligent humans are absolute.

You are right, there is no way to "code for every possibility" that is why you have to train an AI to learn the task from real-life driving scenarios.
The more well-labeled data available the better chances you have of training the NN's to perform the task.
No amount of if/else will ever solve the problem of self driving.

 

[BlindPass]

The sensors on Waymo are fine for this problem. It was never a hardware problem. It was a planning and driving policy problem. The car could easily do the maneuver but timing it right, when traffic is very busy, was tricky. The Waymo car would wait for a gap in traffic before making the turn, and would sit there too long, unsure of when the gap was safe enough to make the turn. So the safety driver would take over. But I suspect Waymo has probably managed to figure that out now. They just needed to improve the planning and driving policy to know when a gap in traffic is safe enough to make the turn.

But you are right that it is hard to train a FSD car to handle every single possibility. That's why L5 is still years away. Again, the problem is not hardware. The problem is getting the software to handle every possible case reliably.

Is the advent of standardized V2V communication (5G application?) a catalyst to getting to L5? I suppose wust the harder challenge (human and machine driving intermixed) needs to be completely “solved”, then eventually see more reliance on machine-to-machine?

Centralized traffic control like we see with trains or planes is unlikely to replace the right to participate in the nearly free-for-all that is car transit. Then again, if we are accepting a robo taxis future, one that is increasingly tied to Tesla’s future and at a level that changes the way we live, it may not be that far/fetched.