Like all similar "why don't they have at least a self/community-supported open basic API" questions, the answer is usually the same: They're afraid someone else might create something of value, in part using their API, without them getting their own beaks wet in the process. If you want to integrate with a Nissan Leaf, even if all you wanted were the most harmless read-only access, they'd like you to request a biz dev meeting with them where they'll be happy to talk ruinous terms.
For a related story, see how Chamberlain (MyQ) torched the great, community-built Home Assistant integration it once had for no reason at all. They're afraid somehow they could stop getting the kickbacks from the likes of Walmart and Amazon delivery which they enjoy today, seeing themselves as co-owners of your garage door.
In most cases it's not about profit, but about having to invest serious amounts of effort to please one or two hackers, who will then DoS your API as soon as you've made a mistake.
Had the whole setup been local first, they wouldn't ever had that issue. But again, that makes it hard to charge people for using it.
This was reported in the media which caused Nissan to start locking down their API something fierce.
Then the three years free of many services have started to expire for most vehicles, so locking it down more became a potentially profitable exercise so now they actual have development work against it.
If you want to have some unified API check https://enode.com/connect, but that too costs a premium.
Is this a fundamental limitation of iOS widgets/APIs, or just something WhatsApp hasn't implemented? Curious if others have found better ways to handle this on iPhone.
[1] https://www.tomsguide.com/how-to/how-to-use-the-WhatsApp-wid...
More like an unfair anti-feature
It's unfortunate that newer cars are not supported.
(yes I know manufacturer tools go deeper but that's another issue)
[1] https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/data-act
So it is arguably more dangerous and leads to fewer sales. But again businesses don’t take positions that are rational if they can take an irrational position that every other business in the sector also takes and therefore easily justify to shareholders without having to present actual numbers they might reject anyhow.
The differentiating factor between car models is not the hardware in the world of EVs. It's the software. And right now, if you aren't either on Tesla, Rivian, or Polestar the software experience is horrific.
Tesla has some great software ideas, and awful execution. Yes, they have the ability to continuously improve vehicles after sale and they use it. But they use it to scramble the climate control location every third month, and to charge subscriptions for hardware their customers already bought.
It's whackadoodle. I mean how different are cars, really? They have wheels, doors, windows, odometers, go places at various speeds, need fuel ... you'd think there'd be some agreed universal baseline like MIDI ... you'd think.
And the manufacturers held on to their protocols like they had done their own Manhatten project so everyone just had to backwards engineer things.
Why is inoperability so precious? Ultimately the purchasing decision is the car's price, features, availability, terms of the deal... The phone app has nothing to do with it, let it go.
-my backup phone connected to my NAS, running a signed in polestar app - a homebridge plugin that called a shell script that used adb to unlock the phone, open the app, grab the screen contents and parse it.
Boom, lock and battery status in homebridge and access to dozens of other tools for creating widgets and shortcuts.
How often does the scraping of the app running on the RaspPi run and how much is the lag between that job running and the data appearing on your phone?
I have been running the scraping workflow once per hour during waking hours the past week, but I reduced that recently because I was starting to feel nervous (but without any real evidence) that pinging the car too often could drain the 12V battery.
The scraping workflow takes between 2-3 minutes to run. You can view the history and duration of runs here if you’re curious: https://github.com/kevincon/nissan-leaf-widget-updater/actio...
I've seen Actions that create a usable Arch etc repos where other software that has been build can be listed
What's the most creative set-up using a number of Actions that anyone has seen? On GitHub or elsewhere
P.S. Could that computational paradigm somehow be extended to a Yahoo! Pipes form of visual [data]flow? For some kind of personal orchestrations
Many people have been bitten by this, it's a common thread on related forums. https://www.macheforum.com/site/threads/ford-suspending-acco...
I don't understand Ford, VW, etc. They make these nice cars that are just unusable junk because of their software.
Like once in a while it would show correct status, or sometimes it would start heating.
But mostly it just lied. Like I could stand next to the car, issue the heating command, wait a minute, force it to check the car's status and it would tell me the car was heating while nothing had changed with the car.
So yea, gave up on the app, didn't use it the last years I owned it.
That said, enjoyed the writeup, looks like a nice project and as a bonus I learned about some new tools.
Maybe I never had the right luxury brand car, but I still see it as such.
If I want to have an app for my car, I’m my opinion that car failed me to provide with a simple, convenient driving experience.
I want to get in the car, check if it’s charged / filled up enough, check for errors (as a routine, but there shouldn’t be any), and drive.
If I need to change anything (AC, light, volume) I should be able to do it without having to take my eyes off the road.
What features do you like so much that you consider them “invaluable”?
> I want to get in the car,
I don't want to have to get in the car to do any of this. I'm able to get the climate control started in the car by saying out loud "Hey Siri, warm up car" (a shortcut I set up exposed by the Tesla app). The location is always up-to-date so if my wife is driving the kids in it, I can see their current location and ETA. I want to be able to open the door without unlocking the car manually. I want to be able to close the trunk remotely if I carried in a load of groceries. Etc.
None of this is some kind of alien technology that Tesla invented, but rather the vast majority of legacy car manufacturer apps are just total garbage piles that were outsourced to some low-bidder somewhere. It shouldn't be that hard.
Ie. The owner has owned the car for multiple years and has never touched the touchscreen even once.
I'd say most people do want to hear it. The anti-tesla crowd is very loud, but very small. As are most movements borne of emotion and not logic.
Now, as not a car person I don't know if there are cars like that, but seeing:
> it seems like the NissanConnect app [...] may detect when x86_64 Android is being used and then refuse to sign in.
Imagine having a ZenPhone 2, downloading an app to manage your car and it refusing to work. I'd go ape.
