Infotainment System - Technical Overview

Architecture

The core of the Infotainment system is written in Node.js. It establishes an Express web server, then uses Socket.IO to manage connections to different control and/or display surfaces. Because display, audio and control surfaces are coded as web pages served up by the Express server, the Infotainment system creates a device-agnostic ecosystem, where any number of devices on any combination of platforms can participate (assuming they support a semi-modern browser).

In general, the Infotainment System can be logically broken down into three parts: the host script, the audio handler(s), and display/input pages.

Host script

The host script operates as the beating heart of the Infotainment system. It manages the services for the display/input interface pages, listens to variable stream information from a miniSim, coordinates interface input, and broadcasts system state data back to the miniSim.

For it's real time interface to a miniSim, the Infotainment system leverages the Route Table to supply miniSim variable data streams (speed, position, ...) as well as write it's own back to the miniSim's shared memory.

Audio handler(s)

By default, a single audio page (infotainment_audio.htm) is included. This page can handle 3 channels of stereo playback:

• Media playback
• Alert (temporarily mutes media playback on play)
• Notify

These are the first three types

Display/input pages

Individual web pages serve up visual interfaces/control surfaces, depending on the desired output. This includes (but is in no means limited to):

• Standard OEM-like infotainment interfaces
• Reconfigurable instrument cluster displays
• General touch and/or voice interfaces
• Head-up displays (HUDs)
• "Alert" devices

By default, the Infotainment System includes an interface for an approximation of the Toyota Entune center stack system (main infotainment and researcher "mirror").

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