Worthless internet browser?

[FlatSix911]

More updates coming ... Tesla is planning a major navigation update ‘light-years ahead’ of current system, says Elon Musk
For months now, we have been reporting on Tesla’s new map and navigation modules that they are testing for an upcoming overhaul of their system. Today, CEO Elon Musk acknowledged the update, which he hyped as “light-years ahead of the current system.”

Back in July, we reported that Tesla is working on revamping its maps and navigation system with its own maps using new open source modules from MapBox and Valhalla. The new map system called ‘Tesla Maps’ was discovered by our Tesla hacker friend verygreen who was able to enable it in his car and gave us our first look at Tesla’s new map system. Last month, we came out with another report after he discovered a new map module in Tesla’s recent 2017.44 software update called ‘Vector Maps’. The main difference seems that it enables a significantly more important zoom and smoother engine. Today, Musk mentioned some upcoming “cool software updates”:

 

[Not1Drop]

Would love to get Outlook Web Access so I could be checking mail on autopilot without breaking Ontario's handheld laws. Instead I spend an hour plus commuting each way listening to the phone chirp every ten minutes as yet another person forgot their password.....oh wait i could just relax and enjoy the drive while the car takes care of pretty much everything.
Browser improvement would be nice though, i'll use it to try and read the news when waiting somewhere as opposed to try and stare at my phone screen for a reduced mobile site feed.

 

[⚡️ELECTROMAN⚡️]

More updates coming ... Tesla is planning a major navigation update ‘light-years ahead’ of current system, says Elon Musk
For months now, we have been reporting on Tesla’s new map and navigation modules that they are testing for an upcoming overhaul of their system. Today, CEO Elon Musk acknowledged the update, which he hyped as “light-years ahead of the current system.”

Back in July, we reported that Tesla is working on revamping its maps and navigation system with its own maps using new open source modules from MapBox and Valhalla. The new map system called ‘Tesla Maps’ was discovered by our Tesla hacker friend verygreen who was able to enable it in his car and gave us our first look at Tesla’s new map system. Last month, we came out with another report after he discovered a new map module in Tesla’s recent 2017.44 software update called ‘Vector Maps’. The main difference seems that it enables a significantly more important zoom and smoother engine. Today, Musk mentioned some upcoming “cool software updates”:

The touchscreen and the connectivity of the Tesla is so incredibly under utilized. There's so much they could do with it, but most of us probably think they won't, because they've done so little with it so far. Hopefully they've been working on a lot cool new features and are getting ready to start releasing some of them.

 

[bob_p]

Tesla's own website often doesn't work with the onboard browser...

 

[Sharpgt]

I didn't know you could use the waze website. I've been using the app on my phone so thanks for the tip!

 

[Snowstorm]

The browser is important, because it is the only window we have now to add custom functions and UX to the car without a real App Store. There are a number of useful sites such as tesla weather radar, tesla winds, tesla waze etc... that allows you to add extra functions to your car main UI.

This can be done on phone, but having a 8" display on your car is so much better than hand held on the phone as long as little interaction is needed due to the slow speed.

I hope the browser gets better, and not gets removed (unless replaced by a real App Store and expanded API)

 

[busaman]

painfully slow

 

[cab]

Like most folks I rarely use the browser (occassionaly for TeslaWaze). However, few weeks ago my wife and I were at a large outdoor event and got separated...and I had forgotten my phone at home! Anyway, I trudged back to the car, found a website that would let me send a text, and was able to text her and let her know I was at the car. It was a bit slow, but it worked!

 

[Texas]

I'm totally in the Tesla camp, but have to say that browsing the internet on the Tesla touchscreen is too slow to be worth the trouble. I never use it. My iPhone does all of the things the Tesla internet browser cannot.

 

[Dbj77]

I'm totally in the Tesla camp, but have to say that browsing the internet on the Tesla touchscreen is too slow to be worth the trouble. I never use it. My iPhone does all of the things the Tesla internet browser cannot.

Yes! And the iPhone does it faster... it’s not just the LTE connection, and I can’t imagine it’s the processing speed. It must be the browser software, which means it can be fixed by an update- Come on Elon!

 

[Cosmacelf]

The Tesla browser was a quick port. No thought to optimization was given. Simple things like selecting text should have been stripped out since you have no cut/copy/paste (and thus no need to select text). I fear that the engineers have convinced Tesla management that they can not possibly create a better browser due to memory and processor speed constraints. I don’t believe this and believe that the browser could be made much better, they just haven’t tried very hard.

Anyone know if the Model 3 also has a crappy browser?

 

[HankLloydRight]

As far as I've seen, no Model 3 has a browser.

 

[Dbj77]

As far as I've seen, no Model 3 has a browser.

If model 3 has no browser, then i suspect model S will lose it when a major update comes along. How many of you will be sad to see it go?

 

[Gentilly7]

Let’s all tweet Elon at the same time asking for an update on the updated browser.

 

[Snowstorm]

As far as I've seen, no Model 3 has a browser.

That doesn't bold well.

If model 3 has no browser, then i suspect model S will lose it when a major update comes along. How many of you will be sad to see it go?

I may be the minority, but will be upset. Without an App Store, the browser is the only way we can add functionality to the car's interface. Right now, I have waze, weather radar, wind speeds on custom web sites that are otherwise unavailable. Yes, one can see them on the phone, but it is quite unlike having hem natively on the in car monitor.

I don't think Tesla would remove a feature that at least some of us use all the time without viable replacement. Though in his case a replacement may be an App Store with new API and not necessary a better browser.

 

[HankLloydRight]

I really don't think Tesla would remove the browser from MS/MX.

Though in his case a replacement may be an App Store with new API and not necessary a better browser.

Elon said this was coming, but backed off on this big time a few years ago. He said that "mirroring" was a better, more secure, solution to bringing "apps" to the touchscreen. And he's also backed off on mirroring, as that proved to be harder than it looks.

Since the development team at Tesla can't even get a working media player released, I have zero confidence they'd be able to create, code, and maintain an SDK and a secure sandbox environment for native apps to run.

After 10 years of iPhone, jailbreaking is still possible. If Apple can't lock down the iPhone 100%, which is just a cell phone, I don't think Tesla would ever be able to, nor would want to open themselves up to hacking cars via a real SDK/App store platform.

And I don't know where Tesla stands on CarPlay or Android Auto, but I don't think that's coming anytime soon, either.

So really, the only option left is hoping for a better browser.

 

[davidc18]

I would not be at all surprised to see the browser removed in a future "update".

I would love to have android auto/car play on the car. Mirroring would also work.

The rear camera feed is about the only useful feature of the MCU these days. My phone gets used for music and navigation.

 

[Cosmacelf]

Let’s all tweet Elon at the same time asking for an update on the updated browser.

Not a bad idea. Since there are enough programmers here, we should tell him if he gives us a generic development environment specs (like a generic Tegra sdk), we will create a slim, fast, modern browser which a single Tesla engineer can then import into their code base.

 

[Cosmacelf]

Actually, thinking about it some more, aren’t there some Tesla code hackers on TMC? If we built a Tegra binary, I wonder if they would be able to test it in their hacked Tesla? At least enough to prove speed and usability?

 

[viper2ko]

Elon tweeted today, update to the browser coming