"Alexa, take the kids to school"
Conversations with your car
In 2017 we saw sales of Amazon's Alexa and Google's Home products shoot through the roof. The connected home has been around for a while but, now we can now communicate with our vehicles.
Imagine waking up and telling Alexa "Alexa, turn the shower on, temperature 38 degrees" and, "Alexa, turn the kettle on". Not so far fetched, users already have access to these features through third party integrations.
Well how about "Alexa, start the car, and turn the AC on to 21 degrees". In the middle of winter this feature alone could save you 15 minutes each morning defrosting the car and waiting for it to warm up, nice right?
Lets take it one step further. So you can connect with your car to make your daily life easier, well now lets make your morning commute safer.
Vehicles are starting to communicate with each other. Much the same as aircraft currently do. Testing is well underway within the autonomous driving industry to make highway driving a safer and more enjoyable experience.
How does it work?
Vehicles emit a signal that alerts other connected vehicles aware of their location and position on the road. This will mean that if a vehicle crosses over in to another vehicles lane or "safe-zone", it will send a warning to the vehicle which forces the vehicle to correct its positioning on the road, all without intervention of the driver.
Other information already available to drivers such as travel-related, petrol station detection and traffic warnings all aim to keep drivers safe. The vehicle receives this data and presents it to the driver in the form of speech or heads up display.
What should I expect in the future?
There are many new features being integrated to help the driver but imagine this... It's Monday morning and you need that extra hour in bed... "Alexa, start the car, take the kids to school".
Its the Jetson's life for all of us!