Comma.ai is going one step ahead to help open source community. George Hotz (Geohot), the developer behind Comma.ai, has made the open source availability of his self-driving technology as well as, instructions for building hardware device called Comma Neo.
Comma.ai has always had the ambition to become the Android version of self-driving cars. The company wants to build a technology to empower mass number of users. Comma One, the first product, was a failure due to its price tag of $999. However, the latest offerings, Open Pilot and Comma Neo, are supposedly better than most car softwares in the market.
The company has open sourced repositories of Open Pilot and Comma Neo on GitHub. Comma Neo is basically an instruction book using which you can create your own robotics platform. The technology enables self-driving to any car for up to six minutes. The driver needs to take control thereafter.
Comma Neo currently supports OnePlus 3 smartphone along with 2016 Acura ILX and Honda Civic Touring. The technology uses smartphone’s rear camera to visualise the road and GPS for navigation. Further, the operating system behind the development relies on the kernel and core services of Android 6.0 Marshmallow.
The latest announcement will enable researchers and after-market manufacturers experiment with Comma.ai and build their own self-driving solutions. Going forward, you can expect to see an interactive assistance from the same source.
