CarPlay Impressions

[AJW]

I read with Android Auto it has the ability to use the cars GPS antenna. So I’m guessing it must mix the map data from the phone with the GPS data from the car. It might be possible to see if the GPS location symbol on the phone is turned off when it’s running maps to prove this. I’ve also read that some of the CAN-Bus data is feed back to the phone, so for example if the car is moving you can’t use the on-screen keyboard but when in park you can. Also if you try to use voice control with the Aircon fan on high it can lower the fan speed.
Wondering if you’ve noticed any of this with Carplay?

Still got another month until I get my GTI-PP and can try it out with my Nexus 5.

[Ralfi]

Not sure about the fan speed lowering. I'll find out & get back.

Spotify...

It seemed buggy at first - menus taking their time to load & the App even froze CarPlay, requiring me to unplug the phone & re-plugging it in to fix the issue.

I tried it again today & seemed to play nicely for the ~5 songs I used it for. Navigating was smooth & no significant delay in loading up songs whilst I utilised a secondary mobiles's wifi hotspot (on the wifi hotspot, I'm yet to work out if MIB II has a SIM slot which turns the car into a wifi hotspot).

Also noticed the Spotify ads appear to be the ones which end with "now enjoy 30 minutes of uninterrupted music" which is good for us on the free Spotify account - no ads every 3 songs.

There was no search function in Spotify's car App though, which is a bummer - needed to search for specific tracks on the phone beforehand.

[mattaus]

There was no search function in Spotify's car App though, which is a bummer - needed to search for specific tracks on the phone beforehand.

Spotify is probably the number one thing I care about. I'm a premium subscriber and spend (easily) over an hour a day
listening to music through the app in my car. No search could be an issue. I wonder if it'll be different for AndroidAuto? A work colleague is going to bring is MY16 Scirocco to work tomorrow and I'm going to plug my phone in and see what happens.

[Ralfi]

Also if you try to use voice control with the Aircon fan on high it can lower the fan speed.
Wondering if you’ve noticed any of this with Carplay?
.

Siri didn't have an impact on the Max A/C airflow fyi.

Spotify is probably the number one thing I care about. I'm a premium subscriber and spend (easily) over an hour a day
listening to music through the app in my car. No search could be an issue. I wonder if it'll be different for AndroidAuto? A work colleague is going to bring is MY16 Scirocco to work tomorrow and I'm going to plug my phone in and see what happens.

Had another decent run with Spotify today. Just one glitch, but it didn't freeze CarPlay - I was able to return to the Home screen, restart Spotify & it worked.

Not being able to search for songs whilst using Spotify in CarPlay is a surprising omission.....

[mattaus]

Not being able to search for songs whilst using Spotify in CarPlay is a surprising omission.....

I'll know more myself tomorrow, but can you at least browse and select your own playlists? Turn shuffle on and off etc? I might do some digging and see if I can find a review somewhere.

[Timbo]

Sounds pretty much as I hoped. I'd like to see the source where it is suggested Android Auto connects to the cars gps aerial, and also has some connection to CanBUS. Hitherto, that's been via the OBDP.

[Ralfi]

I'll know more myself tomorrow, but can you at least browse and select your own playlists? Turn shuffle on and off etc? I might do some digging and see if I can find a review somewhere.

Yeah you can select your own music/playlists.

Not sure on shuffle, as I have a free account, where it's always shuffled.

This video gives a good impression of the App...https://youtu.be/r9p0wb3pI6o

[AJW]

Sounds pretty much as I hoped. I'd like to see the source where it is suggested Android Auto connects to the cars gps aerial, and also has some connection to CanBUS. Hitherto, that's been via the OBDP.

This long article from Arstechnica goes into Android Auto in depth.
Android Auto review: A beautiful, but beta alternative to awful OEM solutions | Ars Technica

This paragraph mentions the GPS interaction:

Besides the obvious input, audio, and video communication, there are a lot of behind-the-scenes transactions happening between the phone and the car. Location and speed input comes entirely from the car. The phone's GPS powers down, and Android Auto uses the car's on-board GPS (when available), wheel speed, and compass sensors. This not only saves power on the phone, but it's much more accurate. The car can get better GPS reception when it's there, and when it isn't—like in a tunnel—the wheel speed can still tell Android Auto how fast it's going in that tunnel. With Android Auto, your location dot won't just die at the start of the tunnel when you lose GPS.

Just because it can do it doesn't mean that VW have implemented it.
But it should be pretty easy to test with an Android phone because you should see the GPS (location) indicator turn off at the top of the screen when it's running maps on the headunit.

There's also this article that talks a bit about "Car Sensor Events" that the Android Auto app listens for:-
Android Auto secrets hint at vehicle diagnostic app, expanded car integration | Ars Technica

This is the list of events that Android Auto "can" listen for, again I have no idea if VW can supply this info back to the phone.

Compass
Car Speed
GPS
Night Data
Accelerometer
Gyroscope
RPM Data
Odometer
Environment Data

Pressure
Temperature
Fuel Level

In Distance
In Percentile
Low Warning
HVAC Data

Current Temperature
Target Temperature
Gear Data

Park
Neutral
Reverse
Drive
Gears "First" through "Tenth"
Driving Status

Fully Restricted
Limit Message
No Keyboard
No Video
No Voice input
Unrestricted

One thing I have seen (Youtube videos of other cars) is it will only let you use the on-screen keyboard if the hand brake is on, if the car is moving it's all voice search.

I'm sure there's similar stuff going on with Carplay, although I don't think you can pinch-to-zoom with Apple maps for some reason.
At least with these phone based systems they will only get better faster than anything VW will do.

[mattaus]

Hmmm, I would love for an AndroidAuto app that can do things with the OBD data like TorquePro can. I was planning on using mirror link at some point (if my next phone supports it) to display TorquePro data on the main screen. If I can integrate all of that into AndroidAuto then I"ll be very happy.

EDIT: Well that sucked. Plugged it in, started AndroidAuto and....nothing. The car just couldn't see my phone. The AndroidAuto help was piss poor (just told you how to connect, not how to do any troubleshooting) so I have some research to do in order to work out if it's the car, the app, or the phone itself. Given the age of the device and the OS I'm using I'll say it's the phone. That being said it uses the right Android version and the app reported no issues when it was started. Perhaps its the USB cable? I was getting a charge but that doesn't mean the cable was fine. I note that when you connect the phone for the first time I'm supposed to get a terms and conditions page. I didn't get that, so the phone doesn't seem to see the car either.

[Flipper Dog]

Matts,
same thing happen to me with android auto when first trying to set it up. First fault checked the cable, then the apps on the phone. A few restarts and curses then it gave up as a bad joke. Plugged in a few days later and started off first time, loaded the phone and no problems since. Looking back at it, may have been the t-shirt I was wearing which didn't connect well with the head unit No could not work out why it was so trying, so don't give up it will work itself out.