In the future, we'll all be able to drive without leaving home. Researchers in Berlin reworked their DARPA-spec autonomous minivan to be controllable by an iPhone app
Posted 10.15.2009 at 9:50 am
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A recent ad for Vodafone featured Formula One champ Lewis Hamilton piloting his F1 steed, as if it were an RC car, using a Bluetooth-enabled smartphone. Many were fooled, some were not, but really it was just a wishful-thinking play by clever ad people.
But one such convergence of smartphones and automobiles apparently is legit. Computer science researchers at Berlin's Free University worked up this Chrysler minivan that can be controlled remotely by an iPhone app.
The team developed its iDriver app to manage the highly modified "Spirit of Berlin" autonomous vehicle using WiFi and the smartphone's controls. The unit's accelerometer controls steering, accomplished at hand by turning the device, while screen buttons control braking and acceleration. The system also sends a live video stream of the road ahead to the iPhone screen.
The van can also drive itself, by way of technologies developed for the 2007 DARPA Urban Grand Challenge autonomous vehicle race (the van was their entry). Packed inside are a stack of IBM Blade servers, video cameras, 3D laser sensors and GPS for positioning, as well as the drive-by-wire system that enables the iDriver app's functionality. In one experiment, a team member reportedly sat on the roof rack and steered the vehicle from above.
[Team Berlin via Engadget]
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This video is so cool!!! is it a real app. because that would be so awesome!!! I havent got an iphone or an itouch but that video is so tight!!!
ive always wanted to invent a driverless car.
perhaps if u just use the gps app with the idriver app, u can call ur car to come pick u up and then tell it to drive u where ever u want.
u can drive autonomously and let the iphone drive for u or u can manually take the wheel.
Too bad we cant get an I-Phone app which would allow us to control our girlfriends and wives.
This could possibly be the end to accidents caused by drunk driving!! Right? unless of course the intoxicated person was driving with the iphone.. But just saying, a person at home could drive their drunk buddy home safe!
No talking on phone while driving. We mean it. Really.
lol the end was funny. it was like mario cart
really cool. but wouldn't that possibly cause more accidents. good thing the iPhone doesn't run simultaneos apps, then people could easily get distracted
So, was there a camera in the vehicle that displayed what it was seeing on the iPhone?