My Ford Touch Thread

[pil__]

Originally Posted by Dick W

MFT is way too big to have been written by one person. Not using the graphics hardware was not a "mistake". It was certainly a design choice forced on the developers by time and money, either before they started or before they finished. As with many engineering decisions, the "time to market" schedule and its end dates force lots of compromises in software development. (Even more of them as the date nears and the product isn't on schedule.) Anbody who's worked in software development has been there, done that, or had to clean up or refactor after somebody else who was. You can bet that the coming "performance upgrade" code was in development before the first car with the present code rolled out of a showroom.

I think you are overestimating the intelligence of software designers :). Never ever assume that the industry is not filled with gross incompetence. And that's almost certainly not a true statement about the development of the performance upgrade. The one thing that I've heard enough to believe it is true is that Ford got rid of the original contractor (B Square) and is using Microsoft (automotive group?) to write the new MFT software. I did have a Ford engineer tell me the new software threw out 100% of the old code and started over (doesn't mean that's actually true, but I've heard hints of this multiple times now).

[Dick W]

Originally Posted by pil__

Never ever assume that the industry is not filled with gross incompetence.

Also true.

The one thing that I've heard enough to believe it is true is that Ford got rid of the original contractor (B Square) and is using Microsoft (automotive group?) to write the new MFT software.

Also wouldn't shock me: since Microsoft insisted on all the "powered by Microsoft" branding for Sync, lots of people blame them for MFT anyway. The MFT product as it sits today puts the whole Microsoft Auto investment at risk just by giving it an unmarketable reputation. Kinda like what Flash does to IE and PC OEM crapware does to Windows.

[Vernl]

I've had the new Focus now since mid November, put about 2000kms on it...had no issues with the MFT, other than the usual..slow etc...but today it locked up leaving the display with no movement and no response to any buttons. I was on my way to get gas, so I pulled in and shut the car off...the screen stayed on and locked after I got out and shut the door.I finished pumping the gas , restarted the car and within 20 seconds, the screen changed to a black background and a large MFT message saying it was performing needed maintenance, it had a scroll bar moving along the bottom and it went for perhaps 30 seconds...then it popped back up and carried on playing music like nothing happened. That was a first for me and I havent seen anything like that posted so i thought I'd throw it in here.
Perhaps i should add that it was locked for a total of perhaps 15 minutes before the ''self reboot'' or whatever that could be called.

[KatHanley]

hi -

picking up my new SEL w/ 301A on thurs and SO stoked. adding mft was a must for me. looking forward to spending some time figuring it out!

i have two questions:

-- is there basic navigation with it, without adding nav to it?
-- if i have two cell phones (don't judge!) will both phone books be added? is there an option to not do that? one of my phones syncs facebook and twitter contacts so i have 1,500++ and i don't want that in my car...

thanks!

[jbird1955]

Originally Posted by Vernl

I've had the new Focus now since mid November, put about 2000kms on it...had no issues with the MFT, other than the usual..slow etc...but today it locked up leaving the display with no movement and no response to any buttons. I was on my way to get gas, so I pulled in and shut the car off...the screen stayed on and locked after I got out and shut the door.I finished pumping the gas , restarted the car and within 20 seconds, the screen changed to a black background and a large MFT message saying it was performing needed maintenance, it had a scroll bar moving along the bottom and it went for perhaps 30 seconds...then it popped back up and carried on playing music like nothing happened. That was a first for me and I havent seen anything like that posted so i thought I'd throw it in here.
Perhaps i should add that it was locked for a total of perhaps 15 minutes before the ''self reboot'' or whatever that could be called.

"MFT message saying it was performing needed maintenance"

That's MFT code for Reboot.

[TiPilot]

Originally Posted by JessicaTi

It looks like they have their act together, especially when it comes to supporting customer's tech needs. Very impressive.

Bought my Focus at Lebanon Ford as well - great folks down there!

Originally Posted by KatHanley

hi -

picking up my new SEL w/ 301A on thurs and SO stoked. adding mft was a must for me. looking forward to spending some time figuring it out!

i have two questions:

-- is there basic navigation with it, without adding nav to it?
-- if i have two cell phones (don't judge!) will both phone books be added? is there an option to not do that? one of my phones syncs facebook and twitter contacts so i have 1,500++ and i don't want that in my car...

thanks!

- Basic nav is available through Sync Services (included w/purchase for 3 yrs, then it's $3/mo) where it uses your cell to call Sync and download the directions to the system. If you miss a turn, etc. it'll have to call back and download a new route. So, not as fast as built-in, but it'll get you there.

- I'm honestly not sure how address book download works with multiple phones. You can definitely pair multiple phones with the system, but beyond that I'm not sure of the intricacies of how it works...

[Vernl]

Originally Posted by jbird1955

"MFT message saying it was performing needed maintenance"

That's MFT code for Reboot.

Thats the logical assumption..I only posted that because every one ive seen here who has been locked up has pulled fuses etc to get things right again and I didnt have to do that...more by luck that anything as I was going to do it when I got home.

[akelley3]

Originally Posted by Vernl

Thats the logical assumption..I only posted that because every one ive seen here who has been locked up has pulled fuses etc to get things right again and I didnt have to do that...more by luck that anything as I was going to do it when I got home.

I've had this happen to me a few times. Completely freezes up and I can't do anything but use the volume knob to turn the volume up or down. It's strange bc the volume keeps on getting louder on it's own volition so I have to intermittently turn it down manually. But I'll turn the car off and get out and the MFT screen will still be frozen for a little bit but eventually turn off after a few minutes. Probably so it doesn't drain the battery.

Sometimes when it happens I'll call support basically to just let 'em know it happened AGAIN! and document the occurrence. They'll tell me to pull the fuse and that the update is coming soon which addresses these issues. I've pulled the fuse before, but now I just let it reboot on it's own.

[JessicaTi]

Originally Posted by KatHanley

hi -

picking up my new SEL w/ 301A on thurs and SO stoked. adding mft was a must for me. looking forward to spending some time figuring it out!

i have two questions:

-- is there basic navigation with it, without adding nav to it?
-- if i have two cell phones (don't judge!) will both phone books be added? is there an option to not do that? one of my phones syncs facebook and twitter contacts so i have 1,500++ and i don't want that in my car...

thanks!

Hi Kat

You can connect a lot of phones to MFT, but you control which phones you connect. You don't have to connect (or "pair") your second phone if you don;t want to.

If you do add more than one phone, only one phone can be "primary", meaning when you start the car, MFT will look for the primary phone first, if it doesn't find it in the car, it will move to the next phone on the list until it establishes a Bluetooth connection with a known, authorized, paired phone. Only one phone can have a BT connection with MFT at a time.

Just pair the phone you want to use and download the phone's phonebook to MFT. I'd recommend turning off the auto phonebook download feature once you've downloaded your contacts, otherwise it may tie up some of the MFT resources everytime you start your car since it will check your device's phonebook looking for any changes like new contacts or deleted contacts.

Until the MFT performance upgrade comes out, let the system boot up and stabilize after starting the car before playing with too many of the features. I know thats hard to do, (especially when the car is brand new!!!) but MFT will be doing a lot of things when you first start it, like MFT and your phone establishing a Bluetooth link, your phone book downloading and comparing databases, "building media commands" for your music database and other stuff.

All of that is resource intensive and if you throw in communicating with the GPS module, the radio, the climate control, navigation cold starting and then calculating routes, Sirius Link downloading gas prices and movie times and streaming music from SiriusXM, the SYNC lady saying "Please Say A Command" all while your phone is trying to lock onto some stray WiFi connection near by, you can run into stability problems lol. Just take it step by step, not everything at once.

Before you pair your phone, do a power off reset of the phone, and continue to do power off resets of your phone every week or so, which keeps your phone cleaned up and less likely to freeze up a bluetooth connection.

Enjoy your new ride!

[shingudaze]

Also note that setting up two phones, then turning on the car when both of those phones are around creates a flipping nightmare if you want one phone to be connected for calls, and the other to be streaming music.

By the time you actually navigate menus, disconnect/connect devices, manually disable/enable BT on the phones, etc. etc. the MFT slows to a crawl and will more often than not (in my experience) freeze and force a reboot. Blah.

One phone, slow, inefficient, unintuitive. Two phones? All that doubled.

I have high hopes for the MFT update coming to us soon, but I'm not holding my breath for phone/BT/pairing niggles to be worked out beyond it just responding faster, and hopefully not freezing.

Awfully unintuitive and way too much maintenance/menu navigation when working with the phone pairing features.