The human/machine interface: technology stokes both the fires of driver distraction and the solutions that keep it manageable

Automotive Industries,  Jan, 2003  by John McCormick

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If you think the person in the next lane is having a hard time driving because he's on his cell phone, wait until he starts using the PDA and the GPS mapping system he just got for Christmas. An increasing number of powerful, small electronic devices are beginning to filter into the automotive environment, and left unchecked, the highways and through streets could become a safety nightmare.

Automakers are responding to the idea of additional information systems inside of vehicles, but the question is how to do it without turning the vehicle cockpit into a zone of chaos? That charge, at a number of automotive companies, is falling under a new acronym -- the study of HMI, or the human machine interface.

"The whole notion of information increasing in the vehicle is an absolute fact and the industry must do something to address it," says Jim Geschke, vice-president and general manager of electronics integration at Johnson Controls (JCI). "If not, people will just find ways to bring the information in themselves. A solution is not to say, 'Well, there's already too much info in the car, we're not going to bring it in,' because we know the consumer will find creative ways to do that themselves. And typically when the consumer does it, it's not done in a safe manner."

Safely integrating technology isn't exactly something brand new. Vehicle ergonomics, packaging and styling have focused on driver "usability" for some time, albeit perhaps in a more subtle way. Today, companies like JCI have developed elaborate testing labs where simulators are used to figure out the best arrangement for all of the devices car companies want to sell to customers.

"We get a good measure of the response time to operate controls in an environment that really simulates road conditions," says Geschke. "This measurement goes beyond just eyes off road, it's more, and this is not technically accurate, mind off road or cognitive loading. For instance, saying the words 'audio volume up' and then 'stop;' you don't have to take your eyes off the road, but you do have to think about that chain of words to drive that function. In our opinion, the cognitive load to utter that statement is greater than taking your thumb and pressing a switch on the steering wheel."

One of the common agreements among most HMI pundits is that information is best served up high. That flies in the face of most cockpit arrangements in the last few years where basic driving information was in front of the steering wheel, and everything else was jammed into the center stack.

That means rethinking the typical automotive layout. It also means trying to push more information into a smaller area, which will in turn push demand for some innovative gadgets in the center cockpit. And that's where it gets exciting.

"The trend is fewer gauges," says Bob Drury, director of engineering for driver information systems at Siemens VDO Automotive. "The big six-gauge SUV clusters are coming down to two gauges with a reconfigurable display. They typically have tachometer, speed and then subgauges, fuel and temp, recessed within those gauges all on a large reconfigurable display. They're mounted higher in many cases than what you've seen in the past. Also, there will be a lot more use of center cockpit, touch screens and reconfigurable thin film transistor (TFT) displays. That's coming very fast,"

Vehicles in the pipeline will increasingly depend on reconfigurable displays for both driver-specific information and non-critical information and entertainment. Those displays let OEMs set up the layout, the menus and the information output any number of ways, and also let drivers use one or two key areas to review all of the data being circulated throughout the vehicle. Some of the first introductions of reconfigurable displays are only tentative steps.

The BMW 7-Series features a fully reconfigurable display in the gauge cluster to present speed and tachometer. But designers felt 7-Series owners would still want an analog-style system and asked Siemens VDO to drill two holes through the LED panel to accommodate the pointer stems.

The Renault Espace now sports a fully digital cluster developed by JCI.

With common displays in visually "friendly" areas, engineers can reduce the time drivers need to review information. Other innovations, like a tachometer that changes color as the engine revs up are also possible. But the trick is not what can be added to super-luxury vehicles, it's making the technology affordable to high-volume, mid-market vehicles.

"What we're driving really hard right now is being able to introduce these seemingly simple concepts into the mass market," says Drury. "Every vehicle has a budget that they need to meet and there is only so much they want to spend on a cluster, yet we want to start adding things like dot matrix displays, so you can get more functionality than you have today. Something we're working very aggressively with our customers right now in North America is to remove cost."