Ford's Smart Car Software Launchs

Not only smart mobile phones, now there's smart cars too. Ford, one of the American's car manufacturer announced at 2013 CES the auto industry’s first open mobile app development program, called the Ford Developer Program, making it easier for developers to create apps for drivers to use safely from behind the wheel.

The software is named OpenXC. The aim is to facilitate developers to create applications that can be installed on an operating system that has been mounted on the Ford cars.

The CAN translator with plug.  
(Picture from:  http://techcrunch.com/)

The OpenXC is a combination of Arduino and the Android operating system, which is installed on smart phones and tablets. The platform collects the recorded data from multiple sensors attached to the car body.

The boxed CAN translator.  
(Picture from:  http://techcrunch.com/)

Based on these data, developers could design the commercial applications to be offered to the car owners. Meanwhile, the car owner could get the readable information that displayed by the application.

The developers will also get hardware in the form of CAN translator, which could translate data from various sensors in the car, such as speed sensors, in order to be understood more easily.

The OpenXC architecture. (Picture from:  http://techcrunch.com/)

According to K. Venkatesh Prasad, Ford's Head of Vehicle Design, the OpenXC is open source software. And Ford also cooperates with another vehicle manufacturers to make these devices more adept at helping the driver to drive their vehicle with more safer. *** [EKA | FROM VARIOUS SOURCES | TECHCRUNCH | BUDI RIZA | KORAN TEMPO 4109]
Note: This blog can be accessed via your smart phone.