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Tesla Autopilot, fatal crash into side of truck 6

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SomptingGuy; Glad you lived to be smarter another day. I seem to know a lot of people who have chronic disabilities caused by car wrecks they've been in. It's very sad really.


V1EBLL said:
The internationally-accepted hand gesture sequence

HA! I'm in California.. Hand jesters gesture from cars are only used to suspend gunfire for reloading.
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Keith Cress
kcress -
 
In California, a hand jester is something different from a hand gesture. Do you want to rephrase that?
 
That came to mind, Steve, as did somebody opening their door to dump out cold coffee cup, etc.
 
Hand jester:

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I haven't gone through everything, but I'm curious to find out if the trailer had conspicuity tape on it? I thought all trailers (and rail cars) have to have reflective stripe elements along the side for visibility, but I admit that I see quite a few without them, so I don't know if this is true or even more of a regional thing.
 
I think the tape is at best an acceptable alternative to reflex reflectors (when the tape itself and its installation meets reflector requirements).

Not sure if AP would have seen the tape any better than the reflectors or the huge box that they'd both be attached to . . .


Norm
 
Now someone has introduced a self driving bus. So if you are at the bus stop and the bus just drives by, it really might not be personal.
 
Reflector tape works great at night, against headlights. In the daytime, not so much, but that does suggest that Tesla could trivially improve its performance by having a IR cut-filtered camera operating in the NIR with an illuminator, or just possibly from the daylight driving lights, which would pick up the reflector tape, and/or see such objects better, since the horizon is more likely to be dark in the NIR, particularly above 850 nm.

TTFN (ta ta for now)
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert! faq731-376 forum1529
 
A collision avoidance system shouldn't rely on characteristics of the object about to be hit. It shouldn't rely on the object about to be hit having reflectors, reflective tape, or being painted white, black, or pink with purple dots.
 
That's the ideal case, and you could probably build something that could do that, but it would probably cost more than the car itself. We built and obstacle avoidance system at a previous company, and our best estimate was about $60k, and that was only one modality of 3 or 4 modalities required.

TTFN (ta ta for now)
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert! faq731-376 forum1529
 
When I taught my eldest son to drive, I taught him to be "looking for empty road" (as opposed to a long list of possible obstacles).

I explained to him that "looking for other cars" (a common algorithm) might lead him to fail to notice bicycles, motorcycles, pedestrians or an escaped hippopotamus.

"Looking for empty road" is the more general (i.e. not dangerously incorrect) solution.

It also correctly covers off the situation where you can't see the empty road because of the six-foot tall snow bank that blocks the view.

I wonder what driving algorithm concept Tesla used?

 
"I wonder what driving algorithm concept Tesla used?" And will they be modified by what we learn from Pokemon Go?
 
I can't help but wonder whether this is fall-out from the recent autopilot failure.


While I've never had any 'professional' contact with any 'Tesla' people, I have visited 'Space-X' several times as part of my former job (now retired) and knew several people who work there. One of the things that I learned about Elan Musk, not directly but from talking to 'Space-X' people, is that he's always willing to do it himself. That is, when he has a problem with a supplier, he's just as likely to bring the work 'in-house' then to go and find another company to do business with. He's apparently done this several times with respect to critical components for his Falcon rockets, particularly engine and fuel system parts, at least that's the impression that I've gotten. Perhaps this is something similar taking place.

John R. Baker, P.E. (ret)
EX-Product 'Evangelist'
Irvine, CA
Siemens PLM:
UG/NX Museum:

The secret of life is not finding someone to live with
It's finding someone you can't live without
 
From recode link: "But to be honest, the Mobileye system is so easy to reproduce; you don’t need the best talent. I did it in a couple of months. Our software can already do more than Mobileye’s."

Clearly an industry in desperate need of some adult supervision.


 
The motormouth saying that was a third party. Motormouth was a polite alternative to many british expressions ending in er.

Cheers

Greg Locock


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