Openpilot Is DIY Autopilot By Comma.Ai
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In September 2015, George Hotz, a famous Apple hacker, founded Comma.ai with the goal of creating an Autopilot-like system that could be adapted to almost any modern car. Most vehicles sold today have drive-by-wire capabilities with the ability to control steering acceleration and braking. So it made perfect sense to Mr. Hotz that these vehicles could be upgraded with an aftermarket DIY driver assistance system to support more robust Autopilot capabilities than they ship with initially.
Now Comma.ai has a full hardware and software package (using openpilot) that brings Tesla Autopilot features to modern cars. Some YouTubers have even compared openpilot vs. Tesla to see how they perform.
In this article we’ll detail the Comma.ai openpilot solution and how it compares.
Early Days
Initially, the company hit several roadblocks after government regulators prohibited the sale of the device due to noncompliance with regulatory standards. So Comma.ai open-sourced the software, called ‘openpilot’, making it available to the public.
Open Source
The goal of open-sourcing the software, called EON, is to democratize and accelerate the rollout of self-driving features which ideally help reduce driver fatigue, errors and accidents. Rightfully so, government agencies have been hesitant to unleash self-driving cars on the public, so engineers and hackers have
Openpilot Software
While other auto manufacturers have cautiously added features, Comma.ai and the community have been improving openpilot.
To be clear, openpilot is a Level 2 software system (see What are SAE Self-Driving Levels?) and requires constant driver attention. Importantly, it’s not an autonomous driving system (think Waymo) and is more like other cars with autopilot in that it is primarily Adaptive Cruise Control (with stop-and-go capabilities) along with Lane Centering. Similar to what Cadillac and Tesla provide.
Source: Autopilot Review
Now Comma.ai has a full hardware and software package (using openpilot) that brings Tesla Autopilot features to modern cars. Some YouTubers have even compared openpilot vs. Tesla to see how they perform.
In this article we’ll detail the Comma.ai openpilot solution and how it compares.
Early Days
Initially, the company hit several roadblocks after government regulators prohibited the sale of the device due to noncompliance with regulatory standards. So Comma.ai open-sourced the software, called ‘openpilot’, making it available to the public.
Open Source
The goal of open-sourcing the software, called EON, is to democratize and accelerate the rollout of self-driving features which ideally help reduce driver fatigue, errors and accidents. Rightfully so, government agencies have been hesitant to unleash self-driving cars on the public, so engineers and hackers have
Openpilot Software
While other auto manufacturers have cautiously added features, Comma.ai and the community have been improving openpilot.
To be clear, openpilot is a Level 2 software system (see What are SAE Self-Driving Levels?) and requires constant driver attention. Importantly, it’s not an autonomous driving system (think Waymo) and is more like other cars with autopilot in that it is primarily Adaptive Cruise Control (with stop-and-go capabilities) along with Lane Centering. Similar to what Cadillac and Tesla provide.
Source: Autopilot Review
07 Sep 2023
