Maned_Fox
Bob DownieA timely safety reminder from Natalie Horberg 🤔
FWIW I'm a massive fan of knobs in cars. One of the first cars I drove was a Volvo 145 which had every knob a different shape so you could locate it by touch alone. The pinnacle of automobile dashboard design!
Dr Alice Violett@geomannie 'Knobs in cars' sounds like a working title for Top Gear 
Tim Ward ⭐🇪🇺🔶 #FBPE@geomannie "every knob a different shape so you could locate it by touch alone"
Just like aeroplanes.
(OK, not every knob, but some of the more important ones. This is supposed to give you a clue when you're pulling the wrong knob, which can sometimes matter.)
Images that make you smile@geomannie Yep, and knobs and dials are still the safest to use... those nopads are impossible as the cars ain't standing still while driving... making it 100% impossible to do anything.. at all
Heliograph@geomannie had many conversations recently about exactly this situation 😬 how did we end up here?!
@davidpenfold
@davidpenfold
Jon Roach@Heliograph @geomannie ah, the head-down display. Obsolete since 1965. But still.
Drey
tessarakt@geomannie It's only illegal to use the phone when it's not fixed to the car. It's also illegal to use the giant iPad when it causes distraction.
TrimTab 🇺🇦@tessarakt @geomannie
So... It's always illegal? I can't think of a moment with the info overload touch screens i deal with in rental cars where it didn't feel unsafe.
Its more profitable for car companies to do touch screens but its getting people maimed and killed.
@TrimTab @geomannie At least in Germany there is a good chance that it is illegal, yes.
itgrrl 
@tessarakt @geomannie this is extremely dependent on the jurisdiction and varies significantly between countries and often between states / cantons / provinces within the same country
zl2todIt's not at all long past that televisions were illegal in cars within sight of the driver here, now you can't buy a car without one.
Dave Mc@geomannie to be fair, Android Auto and CarPlay were initially very limited for this reason. There were limited applications, they had strict guidelines. While the car wasn't parked, you could only press a limited number of buttons and see a limited list of options. But after years of complaints that these car interfaces weren't like peoples' phone screens, they've relented. And manufacturers' interfaces are often worse!
mathew@guigsy @geomannie The problem with limiting CarPlay is that if the screen locks people out because the car is moving, they pick up their phone to do whatever it is they're trying to do.
Beldarak@geomannie
In Belgium you can even get a fine if your phone is at pickup range :/
In Belgium you can even get a fine if your phone is at pickup range :/
Even Minority Report didn't get that far xD
@Beldarak @geomannie - Wish that they would do that here. there is a law driving inattentively while driving with your cellphone in your hand will produce a ticke. though there are stupid people ignoring the law and keep driving recklessly.
François @Jura@geomannie soon this giant display will play ads thanks to the enshitification of everything
ᴮᵉⁿ ᴿᵒʸᶜᵉVOTE IN THE PRIMARIESi had a rental car recently that projected information onto the lowest portion of the windshield
i thought that was pretty cool
then i thought people will start watching movies that way or the car company will beam ads to you that way
then i curled up into a ball, afraid for my life
give us knobs and dials again please
StarkRG@benroyce @geomannie I'll take a hud, just driving info, though. But, otherwise, yeah, knobs and switches are the superior option to nearly everyone except the manufacturers.
Alex@rtnVFRmedia Suffolk UKthere are regulations about what a driver can and can't be shown whilst driving, they start from state/regional level all the way up to the UN and by and large companies (even GAFAM) do obey them, or else the vehicle will be outright prohibited from the roads in many countries and that results in reputation damage and potential lawsuits
(this is why many apps don't work with Android Auto / Apple Carplay, the tech companies do seem to obey (even begrudgingly) whatever traffic authorities insist on
a HUD isn't that uncommon and has been a thing in some vehicles for about 20 years, my sisters 2005 Toyota Yaris had one, and you can buy aftermarket ones for your car if you wish.
I would hope that NHTSA would stomp on any attempt to use HUDs to send ads to folk whilst they were driving (and can't think of any other country in the World that would permit such a thing)
Trebach
Egbert von Laserdisc@StarkRG @benroyce @geomannie I have a 2.5 year-old Mazda CX-30 with no touchscreen, using instead a jog/shuffle dial and assorted switches to operate the 8.8-inch infotainment screen. The built-in navigation system projects basic route info onto the lower windscreen via a HUD, in addition to pictorial indicators of intersection signs, speed of travel. It also displays local speed limits as read by the external camera at the top of the windscreen.
@benroyce @geomannie I bought my last car partially based on having knobs and buttons for the radio and climate controls
Alpaca Male@geomannie In my current rental car, a Seat Leon, I need to navigate through the touch screen menu to increase ventilation or adjust the temperature. There's no way this is safe if you're driving alone and have to do this on your own while driving.
We should have shut this down immediately when car manufacturers started that bullshit.
@alpacamale @geomannie my car does have buttons for climate control... But I rarely touch them. Don't people just leave it in auto at 21C all the time?
@guigsy @geomannie I'm in Slovenia on vacation. When I come back to the car after 6 hour hike, it's hot as hell in there and so am I, as well as drenched in sweat. So I'm adjusting the settings a lot.
@alpacamale @geomannie Why? It'll blow as cold as it possibly can until it gets close to the target internal temperature... which will probably take several minutes. It's climate control.
@alpacamale @geomannie I test drove a car that required normal things be done through the touch screen and it became an instant disqualifier. It was even worse when you had to use a dial near the gear shifter to control the screen
Charlie Phillips/Dolphinchaz@geomannie I've just handed back a hire car (Ford Puma) and it had one of these in the centre of the dashboard - very distracting, and the smaller one behind the steering wheel wasn't laid out very well at all, could hardly see the speedometer.
Adamas Nemesis@geomannie I've never grasped this myself. How come it's "safe" to use this huge screen built into my car with my finger but it's not safe to use my phone if it's mounted in literally the same position?
Bewilderbeast@geomannie, as somebody who works in the service side of the automotive industry, we hate these things, too.
@Bewilderbeast Good to hear!
RAK@geomannie: I've always hated this trend of turning cars into tablets with wheels.
Bond. James Bond.I love that my car is old enough to not have this.