Frequently Asked Questions

What is the relationship between Crankshaft and OpenAuto?

Crankshaft is like McDonald's, OpenAuto is like the hamburger (or the recipe that makes a hamburger). Crankshaft provides OpenAuto in a nice package like McDonald's sells hamburgers in a reasonable amount of calories. We are usually in an open relationship with each other and share resources and ideas. If you want a system that works right now on your Pi 3, get Crankshaft. If you want a system that you can develop new features, test new ideas, then try to clone and compile OpenAuto.

On a more serious note, Crankshaft (and to a lesser extent, OpenAuto) is the easy part. aasdk requires a very deep understanding and reverse engineering of the protocol.

I have a Pi3. How can I test Crankshaft compatibility with my phone before I spend the money to buy the official screen?

Write the Crankshaft image on a microSD card. Connect the Pi to an HDMI monitor. When you see the black Android with the USB with a red "!" icon (no it's not an error screen), plug your phone in. If you see the Android Auto interface displayed on the HDMI monitor, Crankshaft is extremely likely going to work with your phone. You can't control the mouse cursor now, but the official screen will take care of that problem.

I see a lightning bolt in the upper right corner. What is it for?

The lighting bolt comes from the kernel for the pi. It's telling you that it is currently being underpowered. Make sure you have a good power supply and USB cable to power your pi. 2.5A is recommended for the raspberry pi 3.

Why should I purchase an 800x480 resolution screen instead of a higher resolution 1024x600 screen?

Android Auto only supports a few fixed resolutions, of which 600p is not an option. A scaled 480p video stream from the phone will look worse on a 600p screen because 600 is not an integer multiple of 480. The known supported resolutions of Android Auto are as follows:

• 480p
• 720p (requires dev mode enabled)
• 1080p (requires dev mode enabled)

I want to run this on an Android tablet...

Say no more. Use this program: Android Auto Head Unit Emulator :).

I want feature X, Y, Z...

The distro is in an early stage of development, so certain things are more prioritized than others. For example, if possible, bugs get prioritized over enhancements. Earlier milestone bugs are prioritized over others when possible. To see in general what the developer(s) are prioritizing, please see the philosophy page.

Personally, Huan is currently writing his thesis so he might get extremely busy and none of the things that he promised to do might happen at a reasonable time at all. However, this project is hoping to get to a point that anyone can build the system automatically, so Huan can step down from being the dictator to release new versions of Crankshaft.