FordPass just keeps getting worse

[wessermgm]

Count me in the category of the now " plugged in, not charging" camp following the last OTA. As with the above posters, I drive a 3.5L EcoBoost so not an EV or hybrid. My FordPass no longer connects to my truck at all. I also have a Bronco Sport tied to FordPass and it still works as normal, so I'm pretty sure it was was this latest OTA. My fob has never been able to remote start my truck, but I haven't cared because of FordPass. Now, just can't.

Anybody found a fix or do we have to wait for the next OTA to hopefully fix?

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[rdxland]

While I am not having any issues like a lot of folks are...I am a little confused as to how FordPass shows the services on my truck as "unknown service" or something equivalent when the dealer was doing standard stuff - oil change, 20,000 mile service, etc.

 

[RickBullotta]

It’s more than just the FirdPass app or app development, and I don’t think it’s a lack of investment with one exception.
Software development is hard - major s/w development houses (think Apple, MSFT, any application you can think of) have been at it for decades and although they are getting much better, they are still not there.
The s/w development paradigm includes not only coding, but a thorough understanding of system architecture and design (which Ford has obviously not mastered when one considers the plethora of nodes scattered throughout the truck), the ability to manage s/w development, and skills in debug, and importantly s/w validation (in which Ford seems to be woefully lacking). Also important is configuration management.
Ford is woefully lacking in ALL these areas.
So all the guys saying, just hire a bunch of teenagers … NOPE! Not unless you believe in s/w dev, debug, testing and validation by hacking.
Back to investment - Ford needs to make MAJOR investments by hiring top flight software development gurus who understand all this stuff natively, and can translate it to an automotive environment. Not too long ago Ford hired an exec from Apple - a good step, but much more investment is needed. They also need to figure out how to modify its corporate development culture to accommodate complex software projects.
RANT -> off

I've been in the industrial software biz most of my career, including some mission critical stuff and some significant work in connected products/IoT - while yes, it is "hard", what Ford has done is unimaginable. The only thing I can think is that this stuff is being offshored en-masse to a horde of mediocre developers who wouldn't know the difference between a CANBus and a beer can. There's no other explanation for some of the absurd things we've seen. Add to that a complete lack of transparency and communication about what various OTA's do, the rationale/logic behind OTA timing and sequencing, and the mysterious appearance and disappearance of features, and you've got a problem with product management and leadership, not just developers.

 

[PaulGrun]

I've been in the industrial software biz most of my career, including some mission critical stuff and some significant work in connected products/IoT - while yes, it is "hard", what Ford has done is unimaginable. The only thing I can think is that this stuff is being offshored en-masse to a horde of mediocre developers who wouldn't know the difference between a CANBus and a beer can. There's no other explanation for some of the absurd things we've seen. Add to that a complete lack of transparency and communication about what various OTA's do, the rationale/logic behind OTA timing and sequencing, and the mysterious appearance and disappearance of features, and you've got a problem with product management and leadership, not just developers.

Which, of course, was my point. It’s not about the developers.
Ford writ large needs to learn how to do complex hardware/software systems. Which is never as easy as one thinks it’s gonna be.
As I mentioned above, it begins with system architecture, and includes things like configuration management.
What they have now appears to be a hodge podge of independent components cobbled together with several different networks. And it works exactly as well as you would imagine it would.
As for me, I spent my career developing networks for such large (very large), complex hardware/software systems. It’s painful to watch Ford struggle like this.

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