Android Auto Feedback

[Jason-ABRP]

Android Auto support has been submitted as a public beta on Google Play, this thread is for collecting feedback on that version of the app.  For directions feedback please submit that to this thread instead:

This thread should be focused on the specific elements and performance of Android Auto including styling, capabilities and features, and overall usage flow of ABRP in Android Auto.

[maexxx]

Is there a way to see a route overview once you've started driving / navigating? At the moment it seems I can just choose the compass mode but cannot go back to see a route overview.

[Samuel-ABRP]

Hi,

once the route is started, you are not able to see an overview of the route again right now. May i ask, why you need an overview of the route during navigation? I don't think other navigation apps show you the complete route again inbetween.

What is possible however is that your passenger opens the ABRP app on the connected phone, changes the route and sends it to Android Auto which will automatically load the new route and continue navigation on that new route.
 

[AlistairB]

I have found sometimes that when I approach a junction that the map has already rotated as if I've already made the turn into the new road, which can be a bit confusing. Would be nice to be able to change the map view - personally I prefer a 3D view but can't see a way to change out of the 2D view.

[Samuel-ABRP]

3 minutes ago, AlistairB said:

I have found sometimes that when I approach a junction that the map has already rotated as if I've already made the turn into the new road, which can be a bit confusing. Would be nice to be able to change the map view - personally I prefer a 3D view but can't see a way to change out of the 2D view.

3D map view right now is not possible due to the limitations of the map renderer (see here about some more insights). 

[PantsManUK]

Not entirely "on topic", but has anyone done a video "demonstration" of the beta yet? I tried getting it to work yesterday, but didn't have a lot of time to play, and I didn't immediately see it via AA on our Zoe. Not a great hardship if not, I'll mess around over the weekend and see how I get on.

Edited March 25, 2021 by PantsManUK

[Samuel-ABRP]

3 minutes ago, PantsManUK said:

Not entirely "on topic", but has anyone done a video "demonstration" of the beta yet? I tried getting it to work yesterday, but didn't have a lot of time to play, and I didn't immediately see it via AA on our Zoe. Not a great hardship if not, I'll mess around over the weekend and see how I get on.

Did you register for beta and also wait until it said beta is available? It takes a few minutes until the play store registers you to the beta so if you already downloaded it before that finished, you still have the release version, which does not support AA. Please check if there is an update available, which should be once the beta process is finished.

[PantsManUK]

1 hour ago, Samuel-ABRP said:

Did you register for beta and also wait until it said beta is available? It takes a few minutes until the play store registers you to the beta so if you already downloaded it before that finished, you still have the release version, which does not support AA. Please check if there is an update available, which should be once the beta process is finished.

Thanks Samuel. Yes, I signed up for the beta the day "you" released it, but yes, it's possible that I wasn't using the beta version of the app yesterday (the icon on my home screen definitely says "ABRP Beta" now) :-D

I have an old Macbook Air that I use for PHP development work, so I installed Android Studio and DHU, and I've been able to have a play now. I think I get it (certainly in DHU I do); will see if the display unit in the car behaves the same when I have a chance.

[PantsManUK]

2 hours ago, PantsManUK said:

will see if the display unit in the car behaves the same when I have a chance.

Yes, all works perfectly in the car as well.

[lexcyn]

Here's my feedback so far:

• If you are using the GPS coordinates from the OBD dongle, sometimes it will fail and your location will update to the place where you first created your trip. Switching to device GPS fixes this. 
• The map has no zoom controls in navigation or otherwise (need this!)
• When navigating, the map has no 3D view option (like how Google Maps works)
• When navigating, if you are driving south, all road names are upside down.
• The battery and flag icon look like they are from a shareware app from 1999 :)

Some other things I noticed are probably due to whichever map provider you are using - it's very slow to load map tiles initially, and sometimes directions are incorrect.

Not bad for a first beta!

[Samuel-ABRP]

As Google is pretty restrictive with Android Auto we have not so much control on the UI. For example there are no touch events allowed on the map right now, that we could use to implement a zoom in/out gesture. Also each car is pretty unique and does not use the same control knobs (if they have some at all). So its pretty hard to offer a generic zoom functionality right now. But this is on our TODO and we will try to find a way to add this.

As already pointed out in the blog by @Jason-ABRP fancy map modes, vector tiles and other nice map features are currently not possible. And as also stated we are happy that google allowed that SoC overlay at all. Now that we know it can be used we can optimize it and make it more beautiful.

Map tile loading speed will also increase once we switch to vector maps.

 

BTW with some of the feedback we got, we already improved some things, so please make sure you are on the latest version. There should be an update available right now!

[xflow7]

Hooray! Thanks for getting this up and running!

Not sure where you want feedback directed, but I'll put my first thoughts here (based on one short local drive). This is in a 2019 Bolt EV connected to Moto Z3 phone

• Some odd behavior at first when I had to correct an address selection and it appeared that the AA presentation and the phone app got kind of out of sync or the AA interface hung (AA seemed stuck on Calculating Route, while the phone was good to go). Eventually unplugging phone and restarting AA and ABRP sorted it out.
• At first, it seemed like ABRP was preventing simultaneous podcast playback in Podcast Addict / AA.  This seemed to correct itself at some point, though. Not sure yet if reproducible.
• Once running, it worked quite well and overall presentation looks great.
• Minor niggle: the automatic reposition/orientation of the map as the drive progresses is a bit jerky / erratic

Questions:

• Is there a way (or a plan) to access the graph view or other data that is on the mobile app? (I tried pressing the time estimate and charge info to see if they popped out or anything, but that didn't do it.)

Thanks again for all the effort to bring this out!

 

Dave

[CCOLQUITT]

Hi Gang,

Using AA on a phone mount on a Zero SR/F motorcycle - not head unit or anything. Currently the AA/ABRP interface doesn't work at all on mobile. I can "add" the ABRP app in the AAphone app (Android10 so using built in AA and the phone display).

Launching ABRP the long way around at least allows the 'android auto connected' message in ABRP. Route planning then sends the route to AA - but nothing happens. Switching to AA doesn't recognize that any route has been inputted. Similarly, I can't quick launch ABRP from the app - I have to go into the AA app store and open from there each time.

Not sure if AA on phone was your target here - I suspect you were more pushing at head units?

 

 

 

[Samuel-ABRP]

21 hours ago, xflow7 said:

• Some odd behavior at first when I had to correct an address selection and it appeared that the AA presentation and the phone app got kind of out of sync or the AA interface hung (AA seemed stuck on Calculating Route, while the phone was good to go). Eventually unplugging phone and restarting AA and ABRP sorted it out.

 

• Is there a way (or a plan) to access the graph view or other data that is on the mobile app? (I tried pressing the time estimate and charge info to see if they popped out or anything, but that didn't do it.)

We saw the first point as well and it seems that is one of those backend issues Jason mentioned we need to sort out. We are already looking into that one and hope to fix it soon.

There is no possiblity to  implement the graph at the moment, as google is very restrictive with the UI. We already are in contact and hope to find a solution.

12 hours ago, CCOLQUITT said:

Hi Gang,

Using AA on a phone mount on a Zero SR/F motorcycle - not head unit or anything. Currently the AA/ABRP interface doesn't work at all on mobile. I can "add" the ABRP app in the AAphone app (Android10 so using built in AA and the phone display).

Launching ABRP the long way around at least allows the 'android auto connected' message in ABRP. Route planning then sends the route to AA - but nothing happens. Switching to AA doesn't recognize that any route has been inputted. Similarly, I can't quick launch ABRP from the app - I have to go into the AA app store and open from there each time.

Not sure if AA on phone was your target here - I suspect you were more pushing at head units?

I did not even know, AA on the phone could run AA apps. How do you do that? That said i can confirm that this szenario was not on our mind initially. But the AA UI is pretty simple right now and does not offer the full functionality. Why dont you just use the normal ABRP app if you use your phone anyways?

[CCOLQUITT]

2 minutes ago, Samuel-ABRP said:

I did not even know, AA on the phone could run AA apps. How do you do that? That said i can confirm that this szenario was not on our mind initially. But the AA UI is pretty simple right now and does not offer the full functionality. Why dont you just use the normal ABRP app if you use your phone anyways?

You can go to "add apps" - but I'll be honest it seems like a remnant. Doesn't do anything great.

Your point about ABRP app is pretty much what I'm doing. However AA represents a nice 'central console' approach with audio, navigation and additional all in oelne place. It syncs with my helmet audio for calls, etc. Ideally, it would be good it AA could just use ABRP as a maps alternative - same way as it uses Waze (or how it can offer options between books and music on audio).

Obviously, when you're riding, you don't really want to be switching between apps. I mean... Ideally

[IconiqIqon]

Hi all,

I just noticed the great news that a beta AA-version is available and did some testing.

The navigation part works fine and is much better then it was through screen2auto.

Am I right that the settings menu in this beta AA-version is not available, so one can't configure the app for a specific car etc.?

Also I can't find a way to show the list of charging stations and their data ABRP has planned for a route.

Is this the actual state of the app and will this get extended?

[aloha2002]

Hi,

not sure if it has already been mentioned, but I'd like to suggest that the possibilty of split-screen would be nice. On the HU you might see the abrp navigation and on the mobile phone you might see the driving chart, which was mentioned to be restricted by google on the HU.

"or example, we are not optimistic that we'll be allowed to show the driving chart on-screen as it will likely be deemed too distracting.  We'll definitely try to implement this, but approval may be hard to come by. "

 

 

[maexxx]

2 hours ago, IconiqIqon said:

Am I right that the settings menu in this beta AA-version is not available, so one can't configure the app for a specific car etc.?

I think it just uses whatever settings you chose in the normal (non-AA) ABRP. So configure to your heart's desire, then connect the phone to AA and it will use those settings.

[Samuel-ABRP]

2 hours ago, IconiqIqon said:

Hi all,

I just noticed the great news that a beta AA-version is available and did some testing.

The navigation part works fine and is much better then it was through screen2auto.

Am I right that the settings menu in this beta AA-version is not available, so one can't configure the app for a specific car etc.?

Also I can't find a way to show the list of charging stations and their data ABRP has planned for a route.

Is this the actual state of the app and will this get extended?

 Right now you have to change settings in the app, they should automatically be applied to Android Auto as well. However they might not be applied for a current active route (for example if you change the SoC). The safest way is to set everything up and then connect the phone to the car.

Chargers have no extra details right now in AA. So if you want a detailed planning, you can do that on the phone. As long as the overview of that plan is still active or if the app is in driving mode, AA will use that active route and display it when connected. Or you can connect the phone, plan a route and send it to AA via button click.

AA can only show an overview of the route with stops and estimated times. In the end you can sum it up to ABRP on the phone is the planner, while ABRP on Android Auto is the navigation app. They work tightly together, but dont have all the same features. This will of course improve even more over time.

We will of course always add new features and so on in the allowed scope of Google. If you are curious, you can check their guideline document, for what is allowed and what not on Android Auto:
https://developer.android.com/training/cars/Android for Cars Jetpack Library design guidelines.pdf

You will see, that there is not so much freedom to do what we want

[Brian D]

Very happy to see ABRP on Android Auto. I got a chance to try it out properly today. I'm using a Renault Zoe (phase 1) with EV Notify.

A few issues I noticed -

• Voice guidance was muted at the start of the trip but kept unmuting itself during the trip. This happened multiple times.
• When very close to the destination point, the guidance alerted me to charge to 0%. I noticed this on the outward and return journeys.
• Route planning took significantly longer when connected to Android Auto.
• At one point, the map on the screen showed the car stationary with guidance by voice running and route on the phone working. At the next stop, I "force closed" ABRP on the phone and reopened, this helped and ABRP resumed showing the route on the car screen but the issue ocurred at least twice.

[Samuel-ABRP]

Did you by chance ran ABRP app and AA simultaneously the whole trip? Although the long time goal is to support that without any problems, right now I would recommend to not run them simultaneously during the drive. This has not been tested deep enough and could still cause issues.

Can you please elaborate more on the "charge to 0%" issue? Like explain in detail what you did, where you arrived, was that a charger or a plain destination? What showed the instructions window at that time... Maybe also a video next time you see it if you have a passenger or it's safe for you to film it.

[Brian D]

4 hours ago, Samuel-ABRP said:

Did you by chance ran ABRP app and AA simultaneously the whole trip? Although the long time goal is to support that without any problems, right now I would recommend to not run them simultaneously during the drive. This has not been tested deep enough and could still cause issues.

Can you please elaborate more on the "charge to 0%" issue? Like explain in detail what you did, where you arrived, was that a charger or a plain destination? What showed the instructions window at that time... Maybe also a video next time you see it if you have a passenger or it's safe for you to film it.

The app was in the background most of the time. I'll make sure to keep that in mind.

The trip plan on the outward journey had no charging stop and battery percentage was well above the minimum to arrive with. It was just a point A to point B journey. On the return journey I had a charging stop but arrived home with greater than the arrival charge % I specified. Even still it told me to charge to 0% when nearby.

I have a spare phone, I can try set that up to film the car nav screen next time.

[AlistairB]

I was driving yesterday and noticed an issue with the battery indicator. My telematics data wasn't connected, but an old SOC still showed up, and as I drove it seemed to keep thinking that the old telematics SOC was live and update the destination SOC. e.g. the last telematics SOC update was 42% from the day before, ABRP predicted I would use 6% for my drive. At the start the destination SOC was 36% but as I drove it kept a current SOC of 42% and gradually moved to a destination SOC of 42% by the time I arrived. If the telematics data isn't connected should this just be hidden?

Also, would there be any way to show the selected car/profile? I think it's a bit easy to forget to change this if it isn't visible.

[Brian D]

@Samuel-ABRP The phone recording the screen was a bit messy. I do have the video, but quality isn't great.

I managed to record the screen and issue through Android Auto although there's no audio. Hopefully this helps. Let me know if you need more info.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E6KLNQJCdPs

 

 

Edited March 28, 2021 by Brian D

[Samuel-ABRP]

Thanks @Brian D we will look into it however i have never seen that behaviour on my car (Ioniq). Can you please provide more information if you use live data and where it comes from and how you configured the car, maybe also provide the plan, that you used for your trip (you can share and then copy the link to that plan). Also if you could reproduce it in the emulator, it would be extremely helpful if you can tell us how you did it. If we can reproduce it ourself it's an easy fix.

@Alistair when i ran AA on emulator with car not moving, the SoC went down, as if i had entered a SoC without live data. Is your live data regularily updated or is that just the last state from when you last drove and no update was sent inbetween? For example if you query a car API every minute and you dont move the car, the same SoC will repeatedly be transferred to ABRP which results in always using the same SoC i think.

About showing which car you selected: We already have that on the TODO list. We will think about a way to either identify the car somehow based on information from AA (if Google provides that information eventually) or just show something visual in AA so you see it yourself.

@xflow7 we just released an update, that fixed problems with the app communication. Your first point from earlier indicated that you ran into exactly the problem we just fixed.

All:
Please update to the latest version and if you like it provide more feedback (also if you don't  ).