Google Showed a Maserati Running Android and It's Awesome!

At Google I/O 2016, Google showed off a Maserati Quattroporte that’s running Android on a giant 4K display in the dashboard.

Google installed a massive touchscreen in the centre console and also added a display where the dashboard is supposed to live.

The Android system introduces split screen view which is quite interesting, the top half of the screen shows a rotating set of widgets related to your last activity, while the bottom panel is a big view of your current activity. So, for example, when you switch over to maps, you can still get controls for music up top. It’s a lot like how Tesla’s giant touchscreen works.

In addition, Google has added some supplementary information on the display behind the steering wheel, making it easy for the driver to see various icons, album art, contact photos and it’s quite good looking and subtly animated but it kinda makes me sad to see all the old fashioned clocks disappear from the beautiful Maserati Quattroporte.

You can also directly control the AC, heat, heated seats, and even the power windows and door locks from within the Android interface, but all the deeper parts of the car like the brakes or safety equipment is still controlled by a whole different operating system and in all seriousness, would you let Android handle your car’s safety? I certainly wouldn’t.

Google says that this is more about the concept of Android N powering various parts of the car, but it seems to work pretty nicely in this beta.

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