July 2023 – j2i.net

7 Auto Makers Jointly Work to Expand EV Charging

BMW Group, GM, Honda, Hyundai, Kia, Mercedes-Benz, and Stellantis, are planning to engage in a joint venture to add EV chargers across the USA and Canada. This joint venture is dependent on regulatory approval and closing conditions. Their plan calls for more at least 30,000 chargers starting next year. The new chargers will support both CCS1 and NACS plugs (which, in North America translates into supporting Non-Tesla and Tesla vehicles). The new stations are to support the Plug-and-Charge protocol; this means that the charger and vehicle will communicate with each other to automatically charge the drive with the driver not having to do any more than connect the charger to their car.

Starting in 2024 the group says it plans to deploy chargers along major highway and metropolitan areas first. They plan to make use of National Eletric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) funding being administered by the states to improve charging across major travel corridors. “the stations will be in convenient locations offering canopies where ever possible and amenities such as restrooms, food services, and retail operations either nearby or within the same complex.” This sounds a bit like they’ve re-invented the modern gas station, but with chargers instead of gas pumps. But this sounds like a significant improvement compared to some charging experiences, where the chargers may be in an isolated area of a parking lot with no rain cover and no buildings or restrooms nearby.

Some Auto Manufacturers Moving to Tesla Chargers

This announcement comes at the heels of several automakers announcing that they plan to transition from CCS1 chargers to support Tesla’s NACS. This includes Mercedes, Nissan, Rivian, Polestar, and Volvo. Though they made their announcements halfway through 2023, vehicles implementing the chargers are not expected until 2024 and 2025.

While I look forward to the expansion of EV charging availability, at the moment this announcement is aspirational. But it’s a space I plan to keep an eye on as I’m personally interested in seeing EV charging capabilities expand.

Statements from the Joint Venture Members

BMW Group CEO Oliver Zipse: “North America is one of the world’s most important car markets – with the potential to be a leader in electromobility. Accessibility to high-speed charging is one of the key enablers to accelerate this transition. Therefore, seven automakers are forming this joint venture with the goal of creating a positive charging experience for EV consumers. The BMW Group is proud to be among the founders.”

GM CEO Mary Barra: “GM’s commitment to an all-electric future is focused not only on delivering EVs our customers love, but investing in charging and working across the industry to make it more accessible. The better experience people have, the faster EV adoption will grow.”

Honda CEO Toshihiro Mibe: “The creation of EV charging services is an opportunity for automakers to produce excellent user experiences by providing complete, convenient and sustainable solutions for our customers. Toward that objective, this joint venture will be a critical step in accelerating EV adoption across the U.S. and Canada and supporting our efforts to achieve carbon neutrality.”

Hyundai CEO Jaehoon Chang: “Hyundai’s investment in this project aligns with our ‘Progress for Humanity’ vision in making sustainable transportation more accessible. Hyundai’s expertise in electrification will help redefine the charging landscape and we look forward to working with our other shareholders as we create this expansive high-powered charging network.”

Kia CEO Ho Sung Song: “Kia’s engagement and investment in this high-powered charging joint venture is set to increase charging access and convenience to current and future drivers and therefore accelerate the transition to EVs across North America. Kia is proud to be an important part of this joint venture with other reputable automakers as we embark on a journey towards seamless charging experiences for our customers and further strengthening Kia’s brand identity in the EV market.”

Mercedes-Benz Group CEO Ola Källenius: “The fight against climate change is the greatest challenge of our time. What we need now is speed – across political, social and corporate boundaries. To accelerate the shift to electric vehicles, we’re in favor of anything that makes life easier for our customers. Charging is an inseparable part of the EV-experience, and this network will be another step to make it as convenient as possible.”

Stellantis CEO Carlos Tavares: “We intend to exceed customer expectations by creating more opportunities for a seamless charging experience given the significant growth expected in the market. We believe that a charging network at scale is vital to protecting freedom of mobility for all, especially as we work to achieve our ambitious carbon neutrality plan. A strong charging network should be available for all – under the same conditions – and be built together with a win-win spirit. I want to thank each colleague involved, as it is a milestone example of our collective intelligence to listen and serve our customers.”

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Xamarin: “The Application cannot be launched because it is not installed”

Working on a Xamarin project for iOS from a Windows PC I ran into a situation where I could no longer debug the application. There had been no changes in source code from when I could debug to when I could not. A search for the error took me to other places where the problem had been discussed but not resolved. While I’ve been able to resolve the problem for myself, the other discussions were closed and I couldn’t place a resolution there. In the absence of another place to put this solution, I’m hosting it myself.

The more complete text of the error is as follows.

The application 'MyApplication' cannot be launched or debugged because it's not installed The app has been terminated.

Ofcourse, MyApplication would have the name of your application if you encounter this. While I don’t know what causes it, resolve it is a simple matter of erasing files. For my Xamrin project I’m using Visual Studio Community 2022 on a Windows Machine and communicating with an M1 Mac for compilation. On the M1, I had to navigate to the path $HOME/Library/Caches/Xamarin/mtbs/builds/ and erase the files and folders there. Returning to my solution on Windows, I got some other error about files not being found that was resolved by manually selecting dependency projects and recompiling those. After that, I was about to compile and debug the project like I could before.

I’m not sure what causes this error. I would have liked to have looked into it further. But delivery deadlines do not allow further examination. That said, there have been a few other low-frequency errors that I’ve encountered that are resolved by simply clearing this folder.

I hope that this solution is helpful to someone.

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Enterprise Apple Certificates and Expiration

I recently explained the expiration behaviour of Apple Distribution certificates to someone, and thought it was worth sharing.

I often work on iOS applications signed with an Enterprise certificate. Applications signed with these certificates can be distributed directly to the device, such as through a Mobile Device Manager or through the browser. They cannot be distributed through the app store. These applications are signed with a distribution certificate. The Distribution Certificate can last up to one year, but may expire sooner. The distribution certificate will not last beyond the expiration of the account. If a app were signed by an account that has 7 months until renewal is needed, then the distribution certificate will also expire in 7 months.

Usually, this hasn’t been a problem for me. Many of the applications that I work on are either to be used for a predefined time period, such as for a holiday event, and then get shelved. Or they are applications that are receiving updates, in which case they will occasionally get new distribution certificates. I had a client that requested an iOS application be signed such that it would not expire. Someone in the development department for the client had resigned the application and redeployed it when it reached its first expiration period. But he wanted to be independent of their development department all together.

Unfortunately, this is not an option for iOS apps. The only way to have a version of the application that is immune to expiration would be to run it on an operating environment that doesn’t demand apps be signed with certificates that expire in a year or less. That is an option with Windows and Android, but not with iOS. For the best situation with iOS one needs an Mobile Device Manager (MDM). With an MDM, there is the option of making an updated distribution profile and pushing that out to the devices. Without the MDM then rebuild-and-redeploy is the only option.

This may be something that you’d like to consider when choosing hardware for a solution within an organization. iOS hardware is consistent in its form, performance, so on. While Android offers more openness, the variances in hardware is both an advantage and a disadvantage. I appreciate the ability to be able to make an app and install it to an Android device very quickly. OfCourse, the ability to do this easily also comes with the potential of bad actors doing the same. The barrier to getting malicious code on an iOS device is a bit higher.

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