[plarkin]

When I purchased my 2008 Pre-LCI E90 it came with the original navigation DVD. One of the first things I did was to hunt down an updated DVD and found one that included data for known police speed traps and speed cameras. Being an IT/Security guy by trade, I decided to dig into the DVD a bit to see how the extra data had been hacked in... This led me to a little project that I started a few months ago but let stall until now.

It appears that much of the iDrive/navigation menus are HTML driven. There's obviously some sort of middleware that's running to process vehicle-specific controls, but as far as the design, colors, and imagery go; that's all HTML and simple gif files.

Here's an example of what one of the .HTM files looks like in Chrome. It appears to be a specific result page for doing a search for nearby funeral services.



I started experimenting a bit and created a replacement graphic for the "speed trap" icon, added a few characters to some of the search and navigation pages (just enough so I could see if they were displayed) and burned up a new DVD. I didn't invest much time in doing these graphics until I knew that the process would work, and it worked beautifully.

This forked me in two directions; on one hand I wanted to create a custom navigation UI with better graphics and different coloring options, and on the other I wanted to explore more of how the system worked and what other variables were available to read out of the system.

Considering the amount of time I could spend on each and every graphic element alone; I decided to just poke around the system a bit more.... I noticed that the navigation system references two different hostnames within the html. http://tpdhost and http://ctrlhost. This raises a number of questions for me and makes me curious about the hidden network running in the background. I can send directions to my car from Google Maps, confirmed that the parts of the system I've looked at are utilizing HTML and /cgi-bin references, and references to at least two different hostnames acting as web servers......

According to Occam's Razor, my vehicle has an IP address.

Then I got more familiar with the forums as well as Alan@********** and I started spending money .....

So that's where I am right now. I did searches and really couldn't find any threads on this and if anyone else has explored the possibilities of the system. I'm not sure if I'm alone in having interest in this or if anyone else has already dug through it all and figured all of this out. I figured I would post where I am so far and see what becomes of it!

I'm going to be diving back into this with the warm weather, and at the very least will try and post updates if this has any interest to anyone.

[BOosted 335i]

keep us posted

[cbt3]

I would be very interested in what you find out, I looked at some of what the guys over at the X5 forums have done with nav system and it seems like they achieved some level of customization like you are talking about. Would definitely be cool to have control over the color scheme, layout, etc especially if it's as easy as tinkering with .html files. Keep at it!

[ciked]

Sounds awesome. Let me know if there is anything I can do to help.

[weekboy]

subscribe. I know nothing about coding stuff
but thank you and good luck

[myfly335]

Keep us posted good job

[Boony]

I like where this is going, would definitely invest time into achieving something if it leads to a better iDrive experience!

Like change the color of the actual map from the 2012 CD's ugly colors lol

[ciked]

Any updates?

[plarkin]

No new updates. Been spending most of my time on other car projects. I am going to get back on this again very soon though!

[Cgmiller63]

Suscribed