FordPass 3.24.0 rolling out

[dml105]

Unless you are talking about a "hello world" type of application, that is not achievable


precisely

Well, I guess it does deserve comment.
When I was a coder, I pushed zero-bug code - that is to say, my batches were not released if any of the known bugs had not been addressed. That is not to say there were no bugs in my code (though I did pride myself on having extremely few).

What I am saying is that the current industry trend of pushing EVEN THOUGH THERE ARE KNOWN BUGS IN THE PUSH is problematic. The public has come to accept it in non-critical environments, such as word processors and browsers. (Ironically, releasing with known bugs is unacceptable amongst video games - something made purely for pleasure.) The public, and Mach-e drivers in particular, should not accept pushes containing containing known bugs. Instead, Ford should get it right, only pushing when the bug count gets to zero.

To answer @Mirak though (how long would I wait), depends on the feature. The way I see my Mach-e right now, I have a well-functioning, fun to drive car that starts every time and gets me from A to B. Same was true of my A4. The A4 came with bugs that prevented CarPlay from working each time (despite being wired only), and occasionally caused the infotainment system to go black while driving, only to restart when i cut the engine, exited and reentered the car. The A4 doesn’t have OTAs, and I was just fine with the known bugs because they did not interfere with the purpose of having my car. It was six-sigma good. I don’t know for sure that the Mach-e is six-sigma yet, but it seems to be well over 99% reliable. I don’t want to mess that up for convenience things, like the UI, so yeah, I’d be willing to wait years on that fix.

Updates like BlueCruise, though, well that was something that was a promised feature that I currently do not have. I will be upset if it is not pushed to my car this year, and Ford should spend the person-hours to make it happen. But my god, is that ever a mission-critical thing. BlueCruise has to work in a fault-tolerant, elegant-fail way, or people will die. So the balance tips towards getting it right in version 1.0. They can apologize to me with some goodies if they are late, but no amount of apologies will overcome a system that does not work.

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[Kamuelaflyer]

still no watch app...

I don't have the watch, but I'd like there to be an app that works for the watch I don't have. Yet.

 

[JoeDimwit]

Two week for the app but months and months for any vehicle update…. Which is not what was promised by Ford

There is a significant difference between pushing out a faulty phone app and pushing out faulty operating software for a vehicle. I prefer that they play it safe wit my car. Thanks.

 

[rvee]

It's on the App Store now as I type this:

‎FordPass on the App Store (apple.com)

It's not quite live on the Play Store yet:

FordPass - Apps on Google Play

Release notes from the Apple listing:

What's New - 3.24.0​

​

• Now find schedule remote start, departure times and vehicle status alerts at the top of your vehicle page​

​

• Continuous quality improvements under the hood of the app​

​

Keep the feedback coming!​

​

I'm on Android so I can't easily show screenshots of these changes yet but I'm sure someone else will get there since apparently the Vehicle page has changed.

About two weeks since the last release - I'm fine with a 2 week cadence tbh.

Updated it. Know became mostly unusable. Keeos hanging in ford logo

 

[TruWrecks]

The cadence with your former model 3 was much faster compared to the initial releases of software improvements to the model S. Tesla has a much longer history of doing this. It won't take Ford as many years because there is a model to follow, but it will take them some time to get it right.

Tesla also doesn't seam to care if it completely bricks a few cars along the way. They pushed out Model 3 updates so carelessly at times that many Model 3 owners caem out to find a electric doorstop in their driveway a few times. They are getting better.

 

[littlD]

Yeah well unfortunately Ford has bought into Agile big time so everything is now in two week sprints.

Even if we're not getting two week OTA's LOL.

They even used Agile processes to develop the Maverick!

Poor souls.

"Doing Agile" rarely gets companies the results they want (quicker time to market, build what customers want, responding quickly to changing needs, etc).

"Being Agile" has a higher chance for success. This requires a change in mindset, not just "do two week sprints".

 

[Texas-E]

@timbop, @hybrid2bev, @Kamuelaflyer, @dml105 - I realize this is a little off topic, but I'm genuinely curious: how much more time are you willing to give Ford to produce an OTA update with discernable bug fixes or enhancements? Another quarter? 6 months? A year? "As long as it takes to get it right"?

I'm not calling you guys out specifically, btw, you're just the four in this thread who have so far come to Ford's defense. And this is not a loaded question. I'm genuinely curious to know whether you have any expected timeframe beyond which would would start to get fed up.

I would just add that there are folks who are not experiencing some of the bugs being reported.

I personally would like to see at least a quarterly new features OTA, even if they are minor.

I don't want a bug fix breaking something for me because it was haphazardly rolled out. If a rushed propulsion sound fix broke something for me, I'd roll up to your house in whisper mode and piss on your tiny door handle while you slept.

 

[TheStig]

I'm a software engineer. If your software project is super small, maybe there is a possibility of their being no bugs. But with a big project, comes lots and lots of bugs. We tend to triage bugs and put them into different buckets like the following:

• Showstoppers - these bugs get fixed and pushed ASAP. (these should always be at zero)
• Must fix - these must be fixed before the next minor or maintenance release. (these are close to zero, if not zero at release)
• Want to fix - These are important, but won't crash the app or result in loss of data. Every release probably goes out with tens, if not hundreds of these.
• Nice to have - These might never get fixed. They are edge cases and other bugs that rarely happen, or only happen to a small set of users. There are probably hundreds of these in every release.
• Never getting fixed - Some bugs are deemed so minor that we flat out are not going to take the time of day to look into them. Sorry.

This is not how every company does it. There are lots of companies that have 2 buckets; fixing and not fixing. They will just delete bugs until they appear sometime later. Actually, there are thousands of way to handle bugs.

If you are releasing software with zero bugs; congratulations and I hope your unicorn ride home goes smoothly.



Release cadence is another thing that is done differently from different companies. Our web code is done in a way that we can release multiple times a day. This is invisible to the user, because it is web app code.

In general we do major.minor.maintenance releases. If Ford Pass adheres to this(3.24.0), they are on their 3rd major version and have added 24 minor feature releases to this. The maintenance version is mostly for when bugs are fixed and no features are added. Major versions are usually for things like UI re-writes, changes to the underlying system, etc...


I personally think that Ford should be pushing more releases. I'm not saying, push out changes that could affect the safety of the car willy nilly. I just want them to push maintenance bug fixes. If fixing the bug so that the car doesn't ask me if I want the alarm on everytime I turn the car off in anyway affects the safety of the car, then they made a huge, unforgivable mistake in the software architecture of this vehicle and I want my money back now before my family gets hurt.

 

[Mirak]

A good rule to live by in tech is "Never buy hardware today based on a promise of software tomorrow"

Ugh, I know. But the hardware looked so damned good.

 

[Mirak]

I personally think that Ford should be pushing more releases. I'm not saying, push out changes that could affect the safety of the car willy nilly. I just want them to push maintenance bug fixes. If fixing the bug so that the car doesn't ask me if I want the alarm on everytime I turn the car off in anyway affects the safety of the car, then they made a huge, unforgivable mistake in the software architecture of this vehicle and I want my money back now before my family gets hurt.

Well I’m not a software engineer, but this is my thinking also. If trying to fix a sync bug like the alarm setting winds up bricking the car, that seems a massive design problem in and of itself. It’s just very hard for me to buy this explanation for why Ford has to be so slow to fix bugs.

 

[Birger]

I want Ford to forego this software industry trend and push the patches when the bug list gets to zero, not because patches have been scheduled.

In complex systems you would then probably never release because the list does not ever get to zero. Also, the patch packages then get so large that they are a risk by themselves.

Do continuous auto testing, releas often and prioritise hard what needs to be fixed for the release and what can wait.

 

[Kamuelaflyer]

@timbop, @hybrid2bev, @Kamuelaflyer, @dml105 - I realize this is a little off topic, but I'm genuinely curious: how much more time are you willing to give Ford to produce an OTA update with discernable bug fixes or enhancements? Another quarter? 6 months? A year? "As long as it takes to get it right"?

I'm not calling you guys out specifically, btw, you're just the four in this thread who have so far come to Ford's defense. And this is not a loaded question. I'm genuinely curious to know whether you have any expected timeframe beyond which would would start to get fed up.

I don't have any bugs. PAAk works. My audio system works. My profile settings have never changed or been missed. I've had none of the odd problems associated with charging. The only issue I've had is with the liftgate not opening with a kick, and that's directly related to how I'm actually kicking.

Frankly, I don't personally see the need for a bug-fix OTA. I'm quite aware that there are bugs for some people, but I don't have them. And I'm also fully confident that the car will start receiving bug fixes in the thirds quarter,

 

[Birger]

There is a significant difference between pushing out a faulty phone app and pushing out faulty operating software for a vehicle. I prefer that they play it safe wit my car. Thanks.

Much of the SW on the Mach-e is not safety critical. Like the paak problems or random calls that I'm experiencing.

I definitely agree on any bug that is in the safety critical code.

 

[mrim0706]

It's on the App Store now as I type this:

‎FordPass on the App Store (apple.com)

It's not quite live on the Play Store yet:

FordPass - Apps on Google Play

Release notes from the Apple listing:

What's New - 3.24.0​

​

• Now find schedule remote start, departure times and vehicle status alerts at the top of your vehicle page​

​

• Continuous quality improvements under the hood of the app​

​

Keep the feedback coming!​

​

I'm on Android so I can't easily show screenshots of these changes yet but I'm sure someone else will get there since apparently the Vehicle page has changed.

About two weeks since the last release - I'm fine with a 2 week cadence tbh.
[/QUi just updated ford pass app and notice huge improvements on PAAK. Is anyone noticing the same thing?

My car used to not lock after i leave the vehicle and that's fixed. Also it is a lot more responsive on unlocking doors and starting car.

 

[mrim0706]

just updated ford pass app and notice huge improvements on PAAK. Is anyone noticing the same thing?

My car used to not lock after i leave the vehicle and that's fixed. Also it is a lot more responsive on unlocking doors and starting car.

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