It’s always been a goal of mine to learn how to slide into a parking spot, similar to how all the cool guys do it in Hollywood blockbusters. It’s a totally frivolous thing to master, and the chances of ever being able to use it are negligible. In any case, it looks like it will become a totally obsolete party trick now that robots can do it too.
Yes, that’s right. Robots. Stanford University and Volkswagen have had a long partnership in developing autonomous vehicles, fancy speak for cars that drives themselves. As the video explains, making a car go straight on its own isn’t too difficult, but turning is a little bit tougher. Sliding the car is a whole other operation in itself, as the handling characteristics are vastly more unpredictable. Evidently, the Stanford researchers have found a way around this, and have put together a couple neat videos to explain the process in layman’s terms.
Video after the jump
[Source: Crunchgear]
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