Kevin, I just read that thread, thanks. I usually dislike Rickard's
attitude, but he has a point, the 2 products are for different purposes
even if sometimes they somehow match (someone adds GSM to the GEVCU,
someone adds outputs for relays and stuff to the OVMS). I saw the GEVCU
project a while ago and didn't like it much, mostly for Rickard's
involvement, and also because it was quite "amateur", but now at ver 5
it starts to look more professional.
The question is - do we
want to step up the game and start making a truly automotive device? The
answer is no, because it involves HUGE investments and a very
structured company to respect al the standards, but we should at least
try to do our best with our limited resources, and the GEVCU 5 seems to
have taken this direction quite seriously. This is only because they will actually mess with the car's internals; as a mostly read-only interface, OVMS doesn't need that much safety.
The price problem is very important, as the OVMS is mostly an end user "gadget", while the GEVCU aims to be a real ECU. So OVMS have to keep a low price point. Unfortunately the CINCH cases
cost a lot, as Jack said in that thread "A BOM isn't a product. We have more in enclosure and cable than we have in the circuit board very nearly." so we must keep on using "chinese" enclosures, but this doesn't stop us from looking for a better one.
I don't really like the Arduino environment, but if that makes the product more desirable we can go that way, as it should also significantly reduce development cost.
Matt, the new platform should very easily solve all your points, but the 3G modem is still a big question mark for me. Do we really need it? going 3G means higher service prices (especially for international contracts), and you sometimes don't even have coverage.. should consume more current too. A way to share the 3G connection with other devices (streaming radio...) would make up for the higher connection cost.