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Cake day: July 9th, 2023

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  • Conveniently I work in this space, but note the following is primarily my own personal opinion.

    Primarily there’s a few reasons I prefer Android Auto over native Android on the car:

    1. Ever had a phone that’s a few years old slow down in you? Now imagine you buy a car for $60k, and three years down the line the (already sluggish to begin with) Android interface is bogged down by updates and is barely usable. Imagine Spotify drops support for that version of Android Automotive. Android Auto puts all the infotainment into something the customer controls, and something external to the car so you are not dependent upon the OEM to do their own due diligence to ensure functionality and compatibility. If my phone slows down from age/wear/increased software demands, I go buy a new $400 phone. If my car’s infotainment slows down I…buy a new car? (Looking at you GM)

    2. Like I said it moves the infotainment to something in the customer’s (and Google/Apple’s) hand. OEMs do not want this. Auto makers want you locked into their proprietary Android skins for two reasons. First, making it more difficult to leave their specific company’s ecosystem. They (will) build in their own apps that you’ll start putting all your settings and private info on. Things like remembering a driver’s preferred seating and mirror arrangement and auto-adjusting, so when your spouse buys a car you go “Oh well if we both have brand X, it’ll be easier to drive each other’s cars.” Etc. Second, they want all of your data. Legitimately the industry is on fire right now figuring out how much consumer data we can scrape and use/sell with these systems. The Android Automotive stack in a car is 300% sending data back to the OEM of literally anything they are legally allowed to collect. Probably more, too. Plug in Android Auto from my phone and yeah they’re still spying on me, but they don’t have my Spotify login info or my specific apps used, they just have what the vehicle can directly measure (still a terrifying amount).

    In your specific case with a third party head unit…go ham and use the stock interface if you want. Personally I’d still use Android Auto, to top off my phone and to access my local music library (I don’t stream music), but a third party has a lot less interest in spying on you or locking you in the same way an OEM does.

    Also out of curiosity, what head unit did you get? I’ve got a 2012 Cruze I’ve considered installing one of those on but I can almost never find anything that seems actually trustworthy.




  • I don’t have this issue with Jellyfin on my Chromecast at all.

    Sometimes it’ll not “remember” which sub track I had selected when going to the next episode and I have to re-select it, or occasionally it won’t properly burn in the subtitles and I have to back out and restart the episode, but I never get them “stuck” like that.

    I’d recommend trying to change the default player, the player is actually where I find most of the issues arise with subtitles. Jellyfin ships with LibVLC and ExoPlayer on Chromecast, but only uses one by default. I have it set to ask me which player to use for each show, since the subtitles for some of my shows work in one player but not the other.

    Also are you using the Chromecast app for Jellyfin or are you casting to the Chromecast through the Jellyfin mobile app? (Not sure if the latter is possible, but I can see that causing weird behavior)





  • pokemaster787@ani.socialtoMildly Infuriating@lemmy.worldNew cars are great...
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    9 months ago

    I mean, I don’t like my car updating but I’d rather things get fixed than not. Software recalls are a huge headache in the auto industry, and being able to just download an update that fixes something is way easier than going to a dealership and having them use very specific tools and software to update the car/modules.

    It’s also used for anti-theft features for a lot of newer cars, if your car is stolen it can be remotely disabled entirely. That’s really what’s more scary in my opinion.




  • It was a bug in that version of the distro IIRC, trying to install Steam would instead try to install the SteamOS desktop environment (or something along those lines). It has since been fixed to actually install the Steam client.

    Obviously it was a bit silly he typed “Yes, do as I say” after seeing the message, but he was also literally following exactly what all the online guides said to do (other than the “Yes do as I say” part). Luckily it’s fixed now but I do think it was a really good demonstration of what the video wanted to see: “What might the average non-techie gamer face using Linux?”





  • And no way can GM beat Apple or Android at a car interface.

    Poor marketing from GM, Google, and most automakers. A lot of the interfaces are still gonna be Android-based, they’re dropping Android Auto not Android Automotive. Android Automotive being the actual OS that most car infotainment displays come with these days, and is made by Google. Android Auto is just the ability to connect your phone and project it to the display.

    Still a shit move, but GM has nowhere near the capability to actually build a good infotainment OS from the ground up.


  • I can’t speak for the licensing costs of Android Auto or Apple CarPlay, I have no idea what they are.

    But I do work in the automotive industry as an engineer. The sentiment is very much that it’s about getting customer subscriptions and customer data, to build recurring revenue streams that wouldn’t be possible if people are able to just use their phone and its apps on their infotainment display.

    GM at least I know is sticking to Android Automotive, which is built by Google and they pay for anyway. Android Auto and Carplay are just additional functionality built on top of Android Automotive (the naming is bad - Android Automotive is the Google Android-based OS for car displays, Android Auto is the projection tech/api), they’re quite literally removing existing features on a product they’re already paying for.

    I highly doubt Google is giving them a huge discount to cut those features, and if they are getting any it’s dwarfed by how much they want to make through subscription services to use your car.


  • Integrating Android Auto into Android Automotive is even easier than CarPlay, and GM is dropping it as well. It’s quite literally a built-in feature of Android Automotive that has to be actively removed.

    (Just to keep the distinction clear: Android Automotive == A Google Android-based interface for car infotainment, Android Auto == An API for projecting your phone screen and relevant apps to an infotainment display)

    It’s 100% about extracting revenue from customers by forcing them to use the manufacturer’s infotainment ecosystem and charge for recurring subscriptions to things your phone will do for free (and in an actually upgradeable manner).


  • I found what really helps Jellyfin on my Chromecast is setting the player manually. There’s a setting to make it ask which player to use when starting a show and if one doesn’t work, 99% of the time the other one works fine.

    Sometimes switching players doesn’t fix subtitles for me, in those situations I usually have to toggle subs a few times or restart the stream and they actually work.

    In my opinion it’s a minor enough inconvenience given Jellyfin is 100% free and open source, whereas Plex is tracking you and charging you. But of course maybe your media is in some more difficult format than mine.