Powerless F1 drivers frustrated by Bahrain F1 software glitch

jrflo

A question for someone who knows more about F1: Is this firmware shared by all cars? Or some local server at the track the cars connect to? Why is F1 able to control individual cars like this? The article is very light on details as to what exactly is going on...

algoth1

I can't not read it as "They vibe coded a patch in 50 minutes". Had they used Sol 6.1 they would still be waiting

boredatoms

Time to go back to NA engines, the hybrids don't give the rock concert wall of sound

h4kunamata

The Enshittification era keeps on giving. Moved from one of the most fun auto sports to an EV mess. The fact that they were able to vibe code ( You can't truly deliver a code without testing gates in place, let alone release to production, the cars themselves), tells: 1: The teams no longer own the car 2: F1 has become Formula E 2.0

jey

Seems wild that they can code and deploy an update of a critical-seeming component in the field like that. I thought such a firmware update would need extensive QA in the lab, along with root causing why this bug slipped through their processes anyway. But maybe that's the difference between shipping a controller for F1 versus shipping one for an industrial or consumer product? shrug.

HHC-Hunter

Honestly at this point, bring back the V10's.

aetherspawn

Auto software engineer here. It’s frankly because Motorsport software guys are pretty arrogant. They look down on road car and truck engineers, but reality is they develop stuff with virtually no processes and they usually have only very basic engineering skills, yet every day they are told Motorsport is at the forefront of technology. “Motorsport grade” auto components usually means crappy, and everything requires a software patch or constant maintenance to work correctly. Not surprised there was a bug, and not surprised they were able to develop and deploy a patch in 1 hour without V&V testing it or anything.

whalesalad

Make race cars analog again

crypto137

Claude, make my car fast, make no mistakes

MBCook

I just finished watching the race. The start was certainly a callback to the start of the season when cars were dropping like flies and having constant odd problems.

damowangcy

"Meet the F1 developer who fix a critical bug in 50 minutes with AI agent" 2000 PRs per day btw.

Starlevel004

For anyone not willing to click through, by "Bahrain" they actually mean Malaysia.

zkmon

When such complex and powerful machine is doing the actual run, and it has complex logic circuitry, capable of making some decisions, it is similar to horse racing and the machines should be awarded (same as horse), not the jockeys.

SA9G

Oh yes, the insanity of the new F1 power units! The goal was 50/50 Electric/ICE split... but why go hybrid when the cars use fully synthetic fuel and have essentially no runtime carbon footprint? Well for car makers to signal their virtue of course! Did they worry about the mega tons of goods they ship around the globe to race in 24 different countries... or perhaps the armada of VIP private planes that follow... or the 1M fans that drive to each venue? Ok, so hybrid... but where will the E energy come from? Clearly from the brakes, the rear brakes... the same ones that get only a fraction of the braking energy because all the forces move to the front under deceleration. Where is the energy stored, in the battery of course... which is so small it runs out halfway down a single straight. So you basically have a big complicated heavy car with half the power it should... And naturally you have lots of software controlling "deployment" of your meager E reserves. It even guesses where you are on track based on time/speed, because GPS is illegal for that. Sigh... To be clear... I am not arguing ICE is good or E is bad. Just that F1's current specs for the ICE/E mixture is horrible.

unglaublich

> Lando Norris calling the electronic glitches "horrible" and further proof that F1 should move away from hybrids. But the human fireballs, deaths and suffering of gasoline-related accidents are no proof that F1 should move away from gas-power?

PedroBatista

While this is "interesting" for nerds like me. This is also portrait of how embarrassing, fake, boring and not-racing F1 has become. Even the "boring" low overtaking 00's were orders of magnitude more exciting than this clown show. This is also one of the consequences of the FIA Emperor being a complete power hungry fool and many competent people being pushed out of the FIA. Congratulations.