Experiences with a vehicular cloud
computing platform
Jason Flinn, T.J. Giuli, and Brian Noble
University of Michigan and Ford Motor Co.
The Goal
A senior-level course around emerging technologies:
• Vehicular sensors and interfaces
• Cloud storage and computation
• Widespread wireless connectivity
• Social networking platforms
• Partnership between Ford and Michigan
• Class called “Cloud Computing in the Commute”
Jason Flinn
The Hardware Platform
Ford
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research hacked up a Fiesta to include:
10.4” LCD color touch-screen
x86 PC running Windows 7
Wireless connectivity via 3G mobile broadband
Access via CAN bus to telematics, GPS, infotainment
Jason Flinn
The software platform
Integrated sensors via Microsoft Robotics Studio
Also provided:
• Network access services
• Services for interfacing with social-networking sites
• Voice recognition, text-to-speech
Deployed software via a virtual machine
• Allowed development without access to vehicle
• Included APIs for testing with location and sensor traces
• Minimized student time spent with configuration
• Porting to vehicle environment was surprisingly easy
Jason Flinn
Green Ride Challenge
Promotes ride sharing to save fuel, costs
• Structured as a game - earn points for transporting friends
• Real-time updates of who needs rides where
• Agreement protocol for arranging ride-share
• UI runs in browser
• Connectivity issues
• Back end is cloud DB
Jason Flinn
FuelTracker
Measure instantaneous fuel economy:
• Compare to previous economy at same location
• Compare to economy of others driving same route
• Leverage social aspects to share green-driving tips
• Paul Coldren, Clayton Willey, Petch Wannisorn, Amy Kuo
Substantial back-end
computation
Cloud DB
Web interface for
complex stats
Jason Flinn
CaravanTrack
Helps co-ordinate a multi-vehicle road trip
• For each vehicle, shows location, fuel, status, etc.
• Later modified to use voice, steering wheel controls
• Collin Hockey, Sangmi Park, Joe Phillips, John Ciccone
Simple structure
• DB backend
Jason Flinn
Challenge: App participation required
CaravanTrack aggregates sensing data from all vehicles
• Speed
• Fuel
• Stop preferences
Jason Flinn
The Road Trip
CaravanTrack team tested their application on a road trip
• Journey from MI to Maker Faire in CA.
• Four Fiestas – two with integrated platforms
• Sponsored by Ford “American Journey 2.0”
• All ran CaravanTrack
• One vehicle (“AJ the Fiesta”) also ran social apps
• Connectivity was generally quite good (except in Nevada)
• Some unexpected benefits of CaravanTrack
Jason Flinn
Lessons Learned: Network Connectivity
Hosting interactions among vehicles in the cloud works well
• Can easily handle human speeds for social apps
• Connectivity usually sufficient on major roads
• However, bandwidth can be a critical issue
• Good performance needed for short, interactive msgs.
For next time:
• Would like to bring Intentional Network to platform
• Allow background transfers w/o affecting interactive apps
• Utilize networks other than cellular when available
Jason Flinn
Lessons Learned: Sensing
Many interesting apps used vehicle as sensor platform
• Mostly limited to basic sensing: fuel, location, speed, etc.
• Sensor data often shared among vehicles
• Driver is also an excellent sensor
However, substantially more sensors available:
• Steering, breaks, temperature, seat position, cell phone
presence, engine performance data, cameras (internal and
external), …
Vehicle is a great platform for participatory sensing:
• Next time: add and enable more sensors
Jason Flinn
Lessons Learned: UI still a Problem
Designing for vehicular UI very challenging:
• Must minimize distraction by keeping driver’s eyes on road
• No dialogs with timeouts
• All actions restartable
• Only one button per screen region (four corners)
• Use alternative modalities (voice, steering wheel controls)
• Helped a lot to have design student(s) on each team
Many successful apps included a Web component:
• Complicated set-up done at a computer
• Simpler interface used in the vehicle
• More detailed information available later from PC.
Jason Flinn
Thanks to…
Timur Alperovich
T.J. Giuli
Brett Higgins
Brian Noble
Venkatesh Prasad
Azarias Reda
David Watson
Jason Flinn