Tesla has made no secret of the fact that it wants to build self-driving cars, eventually. But, for now, it’ll settle for showing off some mildly useful features, like Summon, where your car puts itself away in your garage or takes itself out, in a display of conspicuous consumption. One coder, though, decided to take it a little further.
Allen Wong, an app developer, realized that Tesla’s apps allowed third-party developers to mix and match Tesla with other Apple functions. You might remember Wong using Tesla’s code and Siri to give his car voice commands. So, he combined Tesla’s app updates with an Apple Watch tool he designed to have his Tesla back out of his garage at the command of his watch.
Summon is still a beta feature; ultimately the idea is that you can get out of your car and it can park itself, so you’re no longer wedged into tiny parking spots or stuck trying to get back it after the one guy who still drives a Hummer parks next to you. But for right now, Tesla users are being encouraged to try it out only on private property. That said, this is still a fun preview of how cars will operate in the future, although we might recommend making sure your garage door and your car are fully synced before you try this. Either that or hope they’ve automated replacing garage doors.
(via Quartz)