this post was submitted on 04 Nov 2024
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Well with a touch screen you have to look at what you’re doing.
With physical buttons, you don’t have to since they have a shape.
Are you looking at your keyboard while typing on your computer? Now try not looking while typing on your phone 🤓
When you're fumbling to find the right switch/knob by feel your focus is still not on driving. It is at best very marginally better, and probably worse because you now think you're still paying attention to driving even though you really aren't. It's still illegal to text while driving, even on an old phone with a physical keyboard, specifically for this reason.
You can’t compare turning the volume control knob in your car to writing an SMS on an old keyboard phone
Volume control is also accessible from the steering wheel on pretty much any car produced within the last 15 years, and certainly any with a touch screen. I'm not comparing to steering wheel controls.
I'm comparing it to fiddling with AC settings on a centre console like everyone seems to me mentioning in this post.
One, the volume knob is far quicker to respond than the usual 'up/down' slow volume adjustment on the wheel. The turn down the overly loud sound from the last driver immediately is nicer with a volume knob.
But with my car with hard A/C controls, I just reach down to the little 'up/down' toggle and tug it down a bit if I feel a little warm or bump it up a little if I feel too cold, or hit the big old button if I need to toggle it off to talk on speaker.
There are a fairly well known set of very common controls that will never be better and need an update. Coarse A/C adjustments, vent direction volume, and next-track are all no-brainers (unless you are Tesla...)
For example, here's a layout that obviously has room and depends on touch for a lot of features, but preserves a reasonably sane set of audio and climate controls (and four miscellaneous functions)
With that you don't look, you know pretty much immediately for the functions you would use.
There's still plenty of room for touch/voice controls for those more nuanced/complicated things that don't fit into button land well. Entering a navigation destination, managing any software updates, setting parameters like "should the car adjust cruise control based on speed limit signs, and if so, what adjustment to the limit should be applied?'
I have to look when adjusting physical buttons in my car, same as I have to look when adjusting things on the touch screen in my car. And I don't have to look at my phone keyboard while typing.
Do you have problems with object permanence in everyday life? or just in your car?
Interesting that you would say someone like that when the options on a screen are in the same place, too.
Why even type this out?
Do you just like arguing stupid points for fun even when you know yourself that you are wrong?
Have you never seen an automotive touchscreen before?
Even within one model/brand there are a ton of panes, and layouts. And even when you choose one layout, which apps are open changes the location and size of the buttons. Now add into that multiple brands, models, layout, and years... And your comment gets more worthless at every step.
Beyond that. The screen doesn't use haptic feedback to tell you where your fingers are so that the parts of your brain that evolved to handle that kind of context can use it without your fucking eyes. 'Oh I touched the round thing, I know there are 4 rectangles next to this' is a built-in feedback loop that a touchscreen does not provide at this time.