Major software update announcement coming July 13th…

[JAGMAN]

What’s curious about all of this is the delay in delivering the remedy. How can the repair or remedy be “unavailable” if cars produced in April do not have this issue? If they April and later cars are good to go, doesn’t that suggest that the “remedy” is available?

Only thing I can think of is the newer cars have a hardware fix and the older cars will have a software patch. I have a late April early May build, so I’ve just been watching from the sidelines out of curiosity.

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[daveo4EV]

What’s curious about all of this is the delay in delivering the remedy. How can the repair or remedy be “unavailable” if cars produced in April do not have this issue? If they April and later cars are good to go, doesn’t that suggest that the “remedy” is available?

Only thing I can think of is the newer cars have a hardware fix and the older cars will have a software patch. I have a late April early May build, so I’ve just been watching from the sidelines out of curiosity.

being able to manufacture a vehicle with all the right bits pre-installed/assembled is one thing

documenting/testing/qualifying a procedure to "modify" vehicles already in the field is a different animal…

I'm pretty sure Porsche has the software "in hand" to address the issues and they know what they want to accomplish - and some vehicles delivered already have that software present…

the question is can they document and deliver a service-tech procedure in the field to upgrade/modify existing vehicles…time will tell.

 

[Windpower]

What’s curious about all of this is the delay in delivering the remedy. How can the repair or remedy be “unavailable” if cars produced in April do not have this issue? If they April and later cars are good to go, doesn’t that suggest that the “remedy” is available?

It's possible that Porsche is still doing regression testing on this software update to make sure it will work with all of the PCM versions out there. I don't take the words "unavailable" literally since in the software field, this might have several meanings.

 

[Visceral]

It's possible that Porsche is still doing regression testing on this software update to make sure it will work with all of the PCM versions out there. I don't take the words "unavailable" literally since in the software field, this might have several meanings.

Due to widespread supply chain constraints, I have little doubt that Porsche used a variety of chipsets in PCMs in 2020-2022. There are a lot of chipsets that do nearly the same thing but require slightly different compilers to be optimal. In a rush, those differences might cause any number of the PCM issues everyone has experienced. Unfortunately that also means a huge range of compilers and chipsets also need to be QA/regression tested.

 

[JAGMAN]

Good points Windpower and Daveo! Nothing done over great distance with complexity is ever easy…

 

[satchurator]

What’s curious about all of this is the delay in delivering the remedy. How can the repair or remedy be “unavailable” if cars produced in April do not have this issue? If they April and later cars are good to go, doesn’t that suggest that the “remedy” is available?

Only thing I can think of is the newer cars have a hardware fix and the older cars will have a software patch. I have a late April early May build, so I’ve just been watching from the sidelines out of curiosity.

Please read my earlier post in this thread, particularly bullet #1.

Its one thing to fix a bug in a software release for a single hardware-software configuration, and its another thing to take that bug fix, adapting as necessary and regression-testing on multiple other hardware-software configurations.

It's likely that there was a pre-existing plan to release a major (6.X) PCM software update for all model-year Taycans, including pre-March MY22s. Why do I say its likely? - because for this kind of large scale multi-configuration software distribution, you don't just decide on a whim to do that to address a single bug. So if we assume that is the case, there would have been a target release date, with product marketing communications, support staff preparations, dealership communications etc. etc. all baked into the plan.

With that assumption - if this planned upcoming significant release presented the best opportunity to distribute the recall fix then the 'delay' is an artifact of the timing of that pre-existing release schedule.

 

[JAGMAN]

Another excellent point, what’s unique and different about this newish era of software fixes being able to fix an outstanding issue is the stop sales that a few members have reported.

It’s good practice to follow a software release schedule that favors less frequent but more comprehensive (and better integrated and tested) software patches. But if it stops you from selling new cars for a few months awaiting the next major OS update, then expect some frustrations…

Perhaps its only affecting a handful of cars that were produced a while back that have yet to be delivered. How do manufacturers normally handle selling a new car that is known to need a recall? Or is this all a supply chain issue?

 

[DerekS]

It’s good practice to follow a software release schedule that favors less frequent but more comprehensive (and better integrated and tested) software patches. But if it stops you from selling new cars for a few months awaiting the next major OS update, then expect some frustrations…

Oh I disagree with that. It is far safer to do more frequent updates with smaller, surgical, isolated changes when you're dealing with live software out in the field.

The more changes you put into one big bang the more risk you're taking on with that push.

Source: I do this for a living

 

[JAGMAN]

I don’t! Made a few edits to clarify a few points….I’m definitely not a software engineer, but I can see the argument for both small bug fixes and for big OS updates. Trying to understand this in the context of “stop sales” and supply chain inconsistencies is what’s interesting.

 

[W1NGE]

I had my ANA5 recall work done today.

The service team had no knowledge of this software release nor nothing further pending in terms of recall for my car.

I continue to remain skeptical on availability for all MYs.

 

[Visceral]

Oh I disagree with that. It is far safer to do more frequent updates with smaller, surgical, isolated changes when you're dealing with live software out in the field.

The more changes you put into one big bang the more risk you're taking on with that push.

Source: I do this for a living

I don't want to nerd out too much as it sounds like we're both familiar with devops, but a wide variety of hardware makes modern devops and the resulting frequent sprints much (much) harder, and I doubt either Porsche or their contracted PCM SW supplier is on the bleeding edge. PCMs in this environment are probably the polar opposite to containers.

 

[daveo4EV]

I suspect VW/Audi/Porsche and their vast and complex supply chain (many components of which have their own embedded software) is using the finest bleeding edge software design practices from the late 1980's…

I honestly surprised my 2020 Taycan does not have a floppy-disc reader for "future enhancements".

 

[Windpower]

I honestly surprised my 2020 Taycan does not have a floppy-disc reader for "future enhancements".

8" or 5-1/4"? (shows how old I am)

 

[daveo4EV]

8" or 5-1/4"? (shows how old I am)

8" was "just" before my time - my Atari 800 had a 5 1/4" floppy drive - ahhh those were the good old days - no OTA updates for that device either - just like my 2020 Taycan.

 

[Windpower]

I used to be a CRT terminal designer and we used 8" floppy drives for years. I hated those things: big and heavy. The 5-1/4" were much more elegant ... for the times.

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