Quite a lot of activity over the past month. It's interesting to note that a month ago, business owners were arrested for keeping their businesses opened during the pandemic and trying to put food on the table for their families. A month later you have rioters and looters burning those same businesses potentially and vandalizing them and the police are standing by because the leadership for their municipality have instructed the police to only observe. My father who was born in Hungary during World War I, used to have a saying when people did things I described above. My father would say, "They should hang the looters from the closest light pole and leave them there for at least a week". Just saying......
I've not made any surf videos for quite a few months because of the pandemic and the beaches were closed here in San Diego. I do monitor the surf cams every morning first thing along with the weather to see if there might be at bump in the swell. Unfortunately sometimes there are some waves and I have other things planned like getting my father's house painted. We grew up in this house my parents bought it in 1954 and it's always been white, but it used to have green trim. I didn't realize how shabby it looked until it had been power washed and painted. I'm currently working on replacing the top railing on the deck that you see in the picture. Due to sun damage and dry rot, they must be replaced and this time I'm going to coat them with a nice layer or two of resin.
About the most exciting thing this happened and I'm referring to personally not nationally, are the updates I get for my Tesla Model 3. I received a software update notice for my Tesla yesterday evening. Every time I get a software update it is like Christmas, what new feature am I getting this time? These software notices and upgrades come about every 3 to 4 weeks. Each time making the Tesla better than it was prior to the update. I did the current update which I won't go into it was very minor having to do with games and camera updates for my car. What I'd like to talk to you about is the previous update a month ago where my car now has autopilot capabilities on city streets and not just on the freeway.
I'm being totally transparent with you, when the driving on the streets autopilot software update came out last month I was not really very excited, it was way underwhelming. I did install the update, I tried it out for one day and then I disengaged it. You can do that with pretty much all the features. Then I started thinking about why they are making you confirm each signal light as you approach?
This is very similar to what they did with the autopilot for the freeway. You can still drive like this, the car will suggest a lane change but you have to verify that it's okay, thus confirming that indeed the lane change was safe and legal. Each time you confirm that it was okay to change lanes, you are enforcing the fact that the computer is making intelligent decisions and what it does for your own peace of mind is to confirm that you can trust the car to make proper decisions and safe decisions.The Freeway AP (Auto Pilot) is so good, I just put in my destination and the car changes lanes, freeways all automatically without any input from me. I realize they are doing the exact same thing with stoplights.
Now when using AP on the streets, a little sign comes on the screen at 600 feet that says you're approaching a signal light intersection. When it gets down to about 400 feet from the signal light you will have to confirm either to stop or to continue. If the light is green you tap the Accelerator once and the car drives through the intersection. If you don't tap the Accelerator then the car stops right at the line and this is really cool. Now when the light turns green, you tap the Accelerator again and the car resumes driving at the posted speed limit.
I did have a couple of questions about this. What if you're sitting at a red light in autopilot and you tap the Accelerator will the car go through the light and the answer is no. I did it a number of times to test it. What if as you are approaching the signal light is green and you tap the accelerator pedal and all of a sudden the light turns yellow? Your car will come to the appropriate stop at the light. From the testing I've done this past month, my car knows if the light is red, yellow or green and responds accordingly. Later this year after the data has accumulated I'm talking about not just millions of miles but tens of millions of miles, then it will give a software update that will eliminate the need for any driver intervention at stop lights. It's clear that the car already knows when the light is red, green or yellow.
If you zoom in on the picture below, you will see an exact representation of the signal light configuration including the color of the lights whether it's red, yellow or green. Mr. Elon Musk has said that by the end of 2020 we will have feature complete self driving. Let me stop and explain if you look this up on the Internet you will see that there are five levels to achieve full self autonomous driving. Level I is the very basic and level 5 is full self driving no need for steering wheel or pedals. You can google this information if you're interested. I would say that we are right and about between level 2 and level 3 right now. Personally if we can get the level 4, that would be incredible. I like my steering wheel and pedals I want to keep them.
Unfortunately I cannot do a video and incorporated in the blog, or I don't think I can. That gives me something to research for next month's blog. If I can post videos or video links then I will give you an example of what it's like driving on the streets in signal lights as I described above. I just googled it, so next month I will add some video so you can see exactly what I am talking about, it is very cool!
Thank you Ken for the email reminder about my blog. I miss seeing my friends like Ken, Larry, Bob and the crew.
God bless you all and stay safe,
Frank
I still Love you Baby! I always will.
