Just a quick hot take: It doesn't matter, most Americans still don't realize that going 25 mph consistently in a traffic jam is better than accellerating to 50 mph for 500 feet then slamming the...
Just a quick hot take:
It doesn't matter, most Americans still don't realize that going 25 mph consistently in a traffic jam is better than accellerating to 50 mph for 500 feet then slamming the brakes.
They also mostly don't care about safe driving distances, no amount of brake lights will save you if you're not at least a 5 count distance from the car in front of you.
I would note this isn't an electric car problem, it's a Hyundai problem. Teslas always signal brakelights with more than 0.2g of deceleration, and I'm sure other brands do something similar.
I would note this isn't an electric car problem, it's a Hyundai problem. Teslas always signal brakelights with more than 0.2g of deceleration, and I'm sure other brands do something similar.
I can say from experience that at least pre-2018 UK Nissan Leafs have this issue. With the regen on full, which is approaching but isn't quite single-pedal driving, they don't engage the brake...
I can say from experience that at least pre-2018 UK Nissan Leafs have this issue. With the regen on full, which is approaching but isn't quite single-pedal driving, they don't engage the brake lights when you lift the throttle. I suspect the brake lights are a physical switch on the pedal, what with the Leaf being a 2010-designed car.
Yeah. I drive a Hyundai Ioniq EV (sadly not the gorgeous Ioniq 5 Alec has, an older model) and I'm super careful about using the higher levels of regenerative braking. I don't know if ICE...
Yeah. I drive a Hyundai Ioniq EV (sadly not the gorgeous Ioniq 5 Alec has, an older model) and I'm super careful about using the higher levels of regenerative braking.
I don't know if ICE automatics feature engine braking but manuals certainly do, so other people on UK roads around me are somewhat used to cars slowing down without the brake lights engaging but that doesn't make it OK for modern cars to not light the brake lights when it's literally just a software decision. EVs and hybrids are the worst for it but there's not reason any modern car has to avoid signalling deceleration.
The really annoying bit is Hyundai could fix it right now and by the time I turn the car on tomorrow the problem would be solved. It just needs a software update and the car is in wifi range whenever it's home.
Actually no, the really annoying bit is that I have these lovely flappy paddle controls on the steering wheel and I barely get to use them because they engage the unsafe braking system.
Interesting, I find the opposite. I drove manuals my entire life up until about 18 months ago when I got my first EV. The more driving aids I have, the safer I feel. If I'm not thinking about...
Interesting, I find the opposite. I drove manuals my entire life up until about 18 months ago when I got my first EV. The more driving aids I have, the safer I feel. If I'm not thinking about gears, clutch, etc. etc. then I have more attention to spare for looking around me. Especially approaching hazards like junctions or roundabouts - none of my brain is taken up deciding I need to be in second gear soon so I need to drop the revs or finding the bite point to hold position for a few seconds on a slope or whatever - I can just look at the actual dangers around me (aka, all the other drivers).
I have never felt so safe on the motorway as when I have the lane keeping and adaptive cruise on. None of my mental capacity is being spent on worrying about speed or tiny steering adjustments, I have such a stronger mental image of where everyone else is and what they're doing.
I never want to drive a wiggly stick car again, personally.
edit: I would add to this that I would like everyone to have modern driving aids like automatic emergency braking, radar warning systems and adaptive cruise because while I am obviously the only good driver for miles and these assistants make me even better, everyone else drives like a half-blind, half-drunk idiot who needs the technology to save them from crashing into me. Some amount of /s in that comment, but I stand by the idea that technology makes driving safer for us all, even when we are cyclists or pedestrians (of which I am both too).
I do like automatic cruise, much nicer than the traditional one (though I would love 'ecocruise' which would peg it to a desired fuel economy on the tach more than speed). I think you're mostly...
I do like automatic cruise, much nicer than the traditional one (though I would love 'ecocruise' which would peg it to a desired fuel economy on the tach more than speed).
I think you're mostly right in many ways. For me the stick stuff all became second nature, except that it made me pay more attention to the topography of the road. I really wish hybrids had more 'space' on the pedal to serve as more of a neutral.
It's probably selection bias, but every driver I know whom drove stick shift for at least a few years is markedly a better driver than those who didn't. Much like computing, I think ease of access overly facilitates lazy, half-ass usage. Less of a problem on a computer than heavy machinery.
I have to disagree here. I'm firmly of the opinion that there's no such thing as user error, only bad design. Computers are "too easy" and people are... well, not quite sure what people are doing...
Much like computing, I think ease of access overly facilitates lazy, half-ass usage.
I have to disagree here. I'm firmly of the opinion that there's no such thing as user error, only bad design. Computers are "too easy" and people are... well, not quite sure what people are doing with easy to use computers here, but I bet a lot of it could be avoided with better design.
If you have a problem on your roads with bad drivers that's not a problem with cars being too easy to use, it's a problem with driving licenses being too easy to get. The system is badly designed such that it allows too many bad drivers onto the roads. It's a bit tricky to compare between countries but everything I can find suggests the USA has one of the easiest driving tests in the world. That seems to be more likely the issue with US drivers, not automatic gearboxes.
Definitely. And keep. Maybe, but sometimes what seems like good design incentivizes the wrong behaviors, and I think computers in particular have gone down that wrong path for a long time. So...
it's a problem with driving licenses being too easy to get.
Definitely. And keep.
I'm firmly of the opinion that there's no such thing as user error, only bad design.
Maybe, but sometimes what seems like good design incentivizes the wrong behaviors, and I think computers in particular have gone down that wrong path for a long time. So here's a big tangent.
Say there's an industrial machine. It has 4 buttons, A/B/C/D. No lights or other feedback. You have to press these in a somewhat random order (B/C/A/D), not sequentially. Training an operator involves teaching them to verify each step, then which press to push when. A good UX improvement is fixing the order of the buttons so they just press sequentially. They still have to teach the operator to verify between steps.
But lets say the next generation has a feedback light. Red/Green, to indicate if the phase worked. The existing operators love this, it makes them more productive than ever. However, a few employee churns later, the training for a new employee sounds more like this: "Go over here, put this thing there. Now press the button, wait for light to turn green, then hit next button. If the light doesn't turn green, call Bob and he'll come fix it."
The seeming improvement of adding feedback to the machine has resulted in lazier training to future operators. They don't need to verify between steps, so they never learn what each step actually does. So long as there's a Bob around, they can happily collect a paycheck by hitting 4 buttons in order. Eventually the machine releases with a new UX improvement to change the four buttons to one. Then Bob retires, and then the machine is useless after it breaks, and the company has to hire on a consultant that worked with V1 of the machine at much inflated rates (this kind of thing happens all the time).
As the idiom goes: "Invent an idiotproof device, and the world will invent a better idiot."
I agree that bad UI facilitates bad patterns. But I also think that just because something is hard to use (in this example: a machine with no feedback) does not mean it has bad UI. And I think for computers, the line is too blurry, and the answer has become "auto-config everything then call IT if something breaks."
If anything, good UI can also facilitate bad patterns. The red light/green light machine is a UI improvement for users that were already aware of how to verify each step. But it also created a disincentive to train new users on how to use the machine properly.
Yes, I have heard this before. At one point in my life I would have agreed with you. But then I spent a lot of time doing very hands-on user interface work, and a lot more time thinking about it....
Yes, I have heard this before. At one point in my life I would have agreed with you. But then I spent a lot of time doing very hands-on user interface work, and a lot more time thinking about it.
In the example of your machine with the buttons, every improvement is a step away from letting mistakes happen. We should design out the possibility of people screwing up as much as possible. Even better to automate the button pressing entirely, and even then you still need Bob around to fix it when it breaks.
If you need a Bob to fix your machine when it breaks - and everyone does need a Bob at some point* - and you don't make sure to train a replacement Bob before Bob retires, that's your bad system design - not a problem with the machine operators or their training. Using the machine "properly" is using it to do the thing it's supposed to do and if that means pressing one button then that's what the training should be. It's not lazy to only train people for the things they need to know to do their jobs, it's just sensible. You work in IT, right? How long have you spent this century with the Windows 3.11 networking manual? Or keeping up to speed on which way around Pentium chips go in their sockets? (briefly, those fuckers weren't polarised, and I fried a small bucketful of them)
If everyone has to know how everything works, then we won't have time to do anything because we'll be far too busy learning loads of stuff we don't need to know. I used to work in helldesk-level IT and most users had no clue how to do anything more advanced than copy and paste, they just wanted me to fix Excel/Access/whatever so they could do their own jobs. Jobs which I had no clue how to do either, which is sort of the point I'm getting at. Auto-config everything and call IT if it breaks is a perfectly sensible way to do things.
Think about how many black boxes there are in your life. Could you rewire your breaker box if you had to? Rebuild a damaged brick wall? Brew beer? Smelt iron? Are you using your computer "properly" if you can't write Assembly? I tend to think that once you start gatekeeping stuff that way, you sort of have to gatekeep everything.
Also if an idiotproof device gets broken by a better idiot then it wasn't ever really idiotproof in the first place. Better design needed, back to the drawing board!
* Even Bob, on occasion, requires Bigger Bob to come and help out.
Humblebrag yes, though I get what you're saying. You got unlucky with your choices of black boxes. The hardest would be fully rewiring the breaker box, mostly because reverse engineering 60 years...
Could you rewire your breaker box if you had to? Rebuild a damaged brick wall? Brew beer? Smelt iron?
Humblebrag yes, though I get what you're saying. You got unlucky with your choices of black boxes. The hardest would be fully rewiring the breaker box, mostly because reverse engineering 60 years of questionable electrical work is a doozy of a time sink. The only things I consider black boxes is parts, stuff that requires highly specialized equipment to repair, like electric motors, machine-made circuits, and fiddly IKEA pieces.
I think the core problem is the philosophy of "its not my specialty so I don't need to learn it" is the attitude that breeds this strange combo of depth with no breadth.
In general, I think the helldesk callers are also the most grossly incompetant at their main job as well. Its almost like taking the time to properly use the tool in front of you makes you better at your job.
Just a quick hot take:
It doesn't matter, most Americans still don't realize that going 25 mph consistently in a traffic jam is better than accellerating to 50 mph for 500 feet then slamming the brakes.
They also mostly don't care about safe driving distances, no amount of brake lights will save you if you're not at least a 5 count distance from the car in front of you.
I would note this isn't an electric car problem, it's a Hyundai problem. Teslas always signal brakelights with more than 0.2g of deceleration, and I'm sure other brands do something similar.
I can say from experience that at least pre-2018 UK Nissan Leafs have this issue. With the regen on full, which is approaching but isn't quite single-pedal driving, they don't engage the brake lights when you lift the throttle. I suspect the brake lights are a physical switch on the pedal, what with the Leaf being a 2010-designed car.
That is unfortunate. Tesla's approach here seems pretty sensible and I wouldn't mind seeing it mandated to all cars.
Yeah. I drive a Hyundai Ioniq EV (sadly not the gorgeous Ioniq 5 Alec has, an older model) and I'm super careful about using the higher levels of regenerative braking.
I don't know if ICE automatics feature engine braking but manuals certainly do, so other people on UK roads around me are somewhat used to cars slowing down without the brake lights engaging but that doesn't make it OK for modern cars to not light the brake lights when it's literally just a software decision. EVs and hybrids are the worst for it but there's not reason any modern car has to avoid signalling deceleration.
The really annoying bit is Hyundai could fix it right now and by the time I turn the car on tomorrow the problem would be solved. It just needs a software update and the car is in wifi range whenever it's home.
Actually no, the really annoying bit is that I have these lovely flappy paddle controls on the steering wheel and I barely get to use them because they engage the unsafe braking system.
I mourn the death of the manual in the USA. I was a much better driver when I had one.
Forces you to pay attention in a way n automatic does not.
Interesting, I find the opposite. I drove manuals my entire life up until about 18 months ago when I got my first EV. The more driving aids I have, the safer I feel. If I'm not thinking about gears, clutch, etc. etc. then I have more attention to spare for looking around me. Especially approaching hazards like junctions or roundabouts - none of my brain is taken up deciding I need to be in second gear soon so I need to drop the revs or finding the bite point to hold position for a few seconds on a slope or whatever - I can just look at the actual dangers around me (aka, all the other drivers).
I have never felt so safe on the motorway as when I have the lane keeping and adaptive cruise on. None of my mental capacity is being spent on worrying about speed or tiny steering adjustments, I have such a stronger mental image of where everyone else is and what they're doing.
I never want to drive a wiggly stick car again, personally.
edit: I would add to this that I would like everyone to have modern driving aids like automatic emergency braking, radar warning systems and adaptive cruise because while I am obviously the only good driver for miles and these assistants make me even better, everyone else drives like a half-blind, half-drunk idiot who needs the technology to save them from crashing into me. Some amount of /s in that comment, but I stand by the idea that technology makes driving safer for us all, even when we are cyclists or pedestrians (of which I am both too).
I do like automatic cruise, much nicer than the traditional one (though I would love 'ecocruise' which would peg it to a desired fuel economy on the tach more than speed).
I think you're mostly right in many ways. For me the stick stuff all became second nature, except that it made me pay more attention to the topography of the road. I really wish hybrids had more 'space' on the pedal to serve as more of a neutral.
It's probably selection bias, but every driver I know whom drove stick shift for at least a few years is markedly a better driver than those who didn't. Much like computing, I think ease of access overly facilitates lazy, half-ass usage. Less of a problem on a computer than heavy machinery.
I have to disagree here. I'm firmly of the opinion that there's no such thing as user error, only bad design. Computers are "too easy" and people are... well, not quite sure what people are doing with easy to use computers here, but I bet a lot of it could be avoided with better design.
If you have a problem on your roads with bad drivers that's not a problem with cars being too easy to use, it's a problem with driving licenses being too easy to get. The system is badly designed such that it allows too many bad drivers onto the roads. It's a bit tricky to compare between countries but everything I can find suggests the USA has one of the easiest driving tests in the world. That seems to be more likely the issue with US drivers, not automatic gearboxes.
Definitely. And keep.
Maybe, but sometimes what seems like good design incentivizes the wrong behaviors, and I think computers in particular have gone down that wrong path for a long time. So here's a big tangent.
Say there's an industrial machine. It has 4 buttons, A/B/C/D. No lights or other feedback. You have to press these in a somewhat random order (B/C/A/D), not sequentially. Training an operator involves teaching them to verify each step, then which press to push when. A good UX improvement is fixing the order of the buttons so they just press sequentially. They still have to teach the operator to verify between steps.
But lets say the next generation has a feedback light. Red/Green, to indicate if the phase worked. The existing operators love this, it makes them more productive than ever. However, a few employee churns later, the training for a new employee sounds more like this: "Go over here, put this thing there. Now press the button, wait for light to turn green, then hit next button. If the light doesn't turn green, call Bob and he'll come fix it."
The seeming improvement of adding feedback to the machine has resulted in lazier training to future operators. They don't need to verify between steps, so they never learn what each step actually does. So long as there's a Bob around, they can happily collect a paycheck by hitting 4 buttons in order. Eventually the machine releases with a new UX improvement to change the four buttons to one. Then Bob retires, and then the machine is useless after it breaks, and the company has to hire on a consultant that worked with V1 of the machine at much inflated rates (this kind of thing happens all the time).
As the idiom goes: "Invent an idiotproof device, and the world will invent a better idiot."
I agree that bad UI facilitates bad patterns. But I also think that just because something is hard to use (in this example: a machine with no feedback) does not mean it has bad UI. And I think for computers, the line is too blurry, and the answer has become "auto-config everything then call IT if something breaks."
If anything, good UI can also facilitate bad patterns. The red light/green light machine is a UI improvement for users that were already aware of how to verify each step. But it also created a disincentive to train new users on how to use the machine properly.
Yes, I have heard this before. At one point in my life I would have agreed with you. But then I spent a lot of time doing very hands-on user interface work, and a lot more time thinking about it.
In the example of your machine with the buttons, every improvement is a step away from letting mistakes happen. We should design out the possibility of people screwing up as much as possible. Even better to automate the button pressing entirely, and even then you still need Bob around to fix it when it breaks.
If you need a Bob to fix your machine when it breaks - and everyone does need a Bob at some point* - and you don't make sure to train a replacement Bob before Bob retires, that's your bad system design - not a problem with the machine operators or their training. Using the machine "properly" is using it to do the thing it's supposed to do and if that means pressing one button then that's what the training should be. It's not lazy to only train people for the things they need to know to do their jobs, it's just sensible. You work in IT, right? How long have you spent this century with the Windows 3.11 networking manual? Or keeping up to speed on which way around Pentium chips go in their sockets? (briefly, those fuckers weren't polarised, and I fried a small bucketful of them)
If everyone has to know how everything works, then we won't have time to do anything because we'll be far too busy learning loads of stuff we don't need to know. I used to work in helldesk-level IT and most users had no clue how to do anything more advanced than copy and paste, they just wanted me to fix Excel/Access/whatever so they could do their own jobs. Jobs which I had no clue how to do either, which is sort of the point I'm getting at. Auto-config everything and call IT if it breaks is a perfectly sensible way to do things.
Think about how many black boxes there are in your life. Could you rewire your breaker box if you had to? Rebuild a damaged brick wall? Brew beer? Smelt iron? Are you using your computer "properly" if you can't write Assembly? I tend to think that once you start gatekeeping stuff that way, you sort of have to gatekeep everything.
Also if an idiotproof device gets broken by a better idiot then it wasn't ever really idiotproof in the first place. Better design needed, back to the drawing board!
* Even Bob, on occasion, requires Bigger Bob to come and help out.
Humblebrag yes, though I get what you're saying. You got unlucky with your choices of black boxes. The hardest would be fully rewiring the breaker box, mostly because reverse engineering 60 years of questionable electrical work is a doozy of a time sink. The only things I consider black boxes is parts, stuff that requires highly specialized equipment to repair, like electric motors, machine-made circuits, and fiddly IKEA pieces.
I think the core problem is the philosophy of "its not my specialty so I don't need to learn it" is the attitude that breeds this strange combo of depth with no breadth.
In general, I think the helldesk callers are also the most grossly incompetant at their main job as well. Its almost like taking the time to properly use the tool in front of you makes you better at your job.