In many cars that's easy to fix. Just replace one relay with a jumper. Standard wire terminals fit in the relay sockets so it's not a permanent modification.

solar powered bluetooth remote

Any good links for projections HUDs?

My cousin had a Pontiac in the late 90s that would project the speed on the windshield.

The steering wheel is where most of this stuff should be all the time. The second you force me to reposition my hand, security levels drop off a cliff, since you get involuntary movement on the other side (as proven by this post) and likely take your eyes off the road, which is bad even for a split second. I know this for a fact, having crashed a car on a motorway as I was turning down the fan (controlled by an analog button, btw).

The best car interface, imho, is something like a rotary device or arrows buttons on the steering wheel (or back thereof) which can be used to manipulate an overlay projected on (or just below) the windshield. My current VW gets close, but the screen is in the lower half of the dashboard (way too far from actual view of the road), and the system can only be partially controlled by on-wheel buttons (the main control is a touchscreen in the middle of the car).

I am 99% sure my Clio had it attached to the steering column, so the controls were always in the same place regardless of the steering wheel angle.

I actually found this made them easier to find, as they're always in the same place relative to the rest of you. Controls on the steering wheel by contrast (as found in, e.g., my current car) move as the wheel rotates, and for some reason I can never quite keep track of where they are.

(The Clio also had the horn button on the indicator stalk. The in-car UX was super on point. Good quality stereo, too.)