A letter from Ecutek to the Subaru Tuning Community

Do you think Ecutek invented the maps in the ecu? Or did they reverse engineer Denso's work?

I don't think the Subaru ECU is an Ecutek invention. This is the reason they can't patent any of their work. They are just as guilty as anyone else who reprograms the stock ecu.

How come people don't say Cobb ripped off Ecutek? They modify the same tables the Ecutek software does.

 

Ecutek in no way whatsoever competes with Subaru or Denso. If anything, they help Subaru sell cars. They are also used by Subaru on some of the Subaru backed rally teams... Subaru is NOT upset with Ecutek.

If Enginuity was started with somebody who straight hacked the ECU, that letter from Ecutek would never have been written, and I would probably be a strong supporter of Enginuity. If I can be convinced that it does have honest roots, I WILL be a supporter.

Because they didn't. How do I KNOW this, because I have spoken to the programmers and I often know more about Ecutek than they do. They don't even have the same tables...

SS

 

Oops. I might have realized this but I read "is it" as "it is" which made it, in my mind, definately not a question. It makes much more sense now. My appologies.

 

So your saying that when you adjust the base timing map with Cobb you are not adjusting the same area of memory that would be changed if you use the Ecutek software to adjust base timing?

 

There are a hundered diffrent tables, ECUtek has some that cobb doesn't and the oppositte is also true.

 

Obviously some things are similar. But actually, the Ecutek WRX tables use double the grams/second load in the axes that Cobb does. Cobb released their tuning software for the STi and WRX at the same time, YEARS after Ecutek had, and the STi uses half compared to WRX, so even parts of the timing table are different. I also know for a fact that Cobb has a TEAM of full-time computer engineers doing their ECU hacking and software programming. These guys make their living working off the Subaru ECU, and they back it up. There are a few tables that Ecutek has that Cobb doesn't, if they were copying them, they would release them too.

SS

 

Under what circumstances do you think Ecutek would have no anti-OS agenda?

One of the themes I keep seeing in this thread is what rights Ecutek does and does not have, and under which circumstances. Rights? It comes down to the first amendment. They can say anything they want. They can try to damage the image of any tool they want, and even had the foresight to make sure they didn't explicitly accuse these projects of stealing from them, lest they be sued for slander. They can complain all they want. And I highly doubt they welcome any competition, as some people have said -- it's not about the challenge, they are running a business. It's about money.

The only would have I think is even remotely true is that if Ecutek had any real evidence that anything had been stolen from them by any of these three projects, there would have been a lawsuit. And their case could have been complete BS -- they'd need just enough to convince a court to hear their case, because as volunteering individuals, we can't afford the lawyers to fight them. Period. End of story.

I'll say this one last time. The tables are not the issue. I have shown you where the tables came from.

As I started my first post saying, I usually avoid these kinds of discussions about Enginuity. I took special exception to this post and told you my side. In my opinion, what I said discounts all of Ecutek's implied accusations. Enginuity is my baby, and I can personally gaurantee you, 100% legal, legitimate and ethical, by any standards. Maybe I'm the typical over sensitive programmer, but when you talk about Enginuity, I take it personally, and discussing these issues is not worth the heartache. Everything you need to know to see past Ecutek's lies is there for those who want to see it.

God damn I'm glad I'm not selling Enginuity, or these issues would actually matter.

 

I also heard that someone local has a cobb v2 AP with no lift shifting and launch control, yet ECUtek doesn't have it.

Hmmmm

 

I understand YOUR Enginuity, the GUI that works the XML is 100% original. I don't doubt that, but the initial technique/technology, etc for getting into the ECU, where did THAT come from.

This might help me, where did the tables in the screen shot come from? Obviously THOSE were stolen. Is anything in Enginuity now a result of that?

SS

 

Personally I think both sides suck....lol

ECUtek says this "OPEN ECU**" says that

Standalone FTW


Matt

**sorry I had to

 

For the record I don't really have anything against any of the open source programs that are out there, other than the complete lack of customer support.

I really don't care who or where they got the code for their programs. I won't be using them on any car that I care about, because I want that customer support behind me.

Matt

 

You had alot to read thru to get caught up. No harm, no foul.

I think the underlying problem here is very simple. It relates to my work the same as it relates to this topic.

At my work, I was once allowed to wear jeans everyday. Someone came in one day with jeans that were ripped. Because of this, my work changed the dress code and now we are business casual.

How does my work story relate to this discussion? It is a prime example of the one (or few) ruining it for the many.

For this topic, because of the one (that you mentioned yourself, without saying names) you now have to defend yourself from the perception that your work is directly ripped off from EcuTek.

I may be wrong here, but I think what Scott is trying to get at is: Could you do your work (Team Enginuity) without what the other guy did.

Here is a quote from your first post, when I say the other guy, I am refering to the person you are talking about here

So again, could you do the things you are doing if the person above did not do what he did?

The part there about 1) it does have questionable origins, without those questionable origins, could you do what you do?

 

so there are like 6 or 7 useful posts in 3 pages of discussion, what an insightful thread

 

My thoughts exactly. From my point of view, the lack of true customer support would push me away from this, but that is just me.


btw, the mud slinging is very childish

 

Hey on that other forum it would have taken 26 pages to get those 7 useful post.

 

true, very true, but they also have 10x more members.

 

Well, that's frustrating. I just typed a big long reply, and something happened and it didn't get posted. So you're going to get the shorter re-reply.

The definitions in that screenshot appear to have been generated by a utility called Xmlwrite. He has been quiet about the origins but it would certainly seem to be taken directly from ecutek. But, however unlikely, they could just as easily have created the definitions themselves. And Xmlwrite is unassociated.

Our definitions are created and maintained by hand in a text editor by Bill Gregg. That's over 20,000 lines, 2mb of text. He reformatted them to work with ECU Flash, and ecuEdit now has the ability to convert them to its own format. So no Open Source blanket covered project uses them.

Bill is that cool. He's also the guy working on RamTune, launch control, per gear WG duty compensation and other goodies enhancing the stock ECU.

 

no, more like 127.5 pages.

on a side note, me thinks it was NOT a wise decision for SS to post this. PERIOD.

 

woah, someone ninja edited. nevermind.

 

I saw that Will. hahahaha.....didn't your teacher ever tell you it's bad to plagiarize?

 

well i was going to respond to dude's short reply, which by the time I quoted and realized it was not so short...it was slightly less short than original...so then it didnt matter anymore.

 

Leave it to me to post a message and totally forget to include my original point...

 

exacto'mondo.

 

There were plenty of people working on finding the maps before Enginuity came along. I spent quite a bit of time digging through the hex files and trying to configure this software to edit a subaru image. Before enginuity and the other software in question came along there were already quite a few maps discovered. I had the tunerpro software below configured with more maps than you could tune with a Utec.

http://tunerpro.markmansur.com/screenshots.htm

While it may not have true customer support it does have a community just like this wrxatl community. If you have a question or an issue you can post there. That is what openecu is.

Enginuity is just a binary file editing software like the software above. Both of these sapplications leave it up to the user to define their functionality.

 

Like you have already stated a forum is not customer support. Not for an individual and certainly not for an established tuner.

 

Just so people understand, Jared and I have actually had quite friendly private conversations. I might even be tuning his car

All I want answered at this point (and one of you other open source people might know this) is "Was the original software created by somebody who got their hands on the Ecutek software itself, or was it hacked from the ECU."

SS

 

All I want to know is do you want me to install this AVCR or do you want to keep using the stock ecu to control boost.

Matt

 

Sorry i think they are very closely related. I dont have a degree in economics and have never taken a class

To me (IMO) the Orig Post was the main reason = Market share which in turn is Profit. The more one sells a product the cost drops exponentially hence more profit. The larger market share allows you to both increase sales = profit and reduce cost. Thats my believe. You cannot be profitable if you have 0 market share

 

I think the AVC-R is a good idea. I'm in and out of cell service here...

SS

 

gottcha, Il install it tommrow.

 

To me - I am my own customer support
If i dont know how to use the application i better not press "send". If I crash the ECU then its not enginuity or and Openecu SW's fault they didnt ask me to use it I didnt pay $ to get it and sure hell I asked for it.

Yes it takes some time to get an answer and at times numerous diff answers too.

The Day i mod my car the day I dont expect Saab to honor the warranty if i broke it because i was asking the car to do more than Factory.

Yes I am worried everytime i stick the plug into the socket and transfer the juice over (for free):naughty: . Same thing goes for real life situation - If you are concerned pay the $$$$ and have someone take care of your needs.

 

If that works for you great. To me thats unacceptable, things go wrong that you have no control over and you can't possibly have enough experince to solve every problem. I don't want to go digging through some forum to try and find the answer.

If THE SIEGEL needs tech support then so do I.

 

Scott, I think that this thread is very emotionally charged and as Matt (slowwrx) stated about assuming, you are assuming that Ecutek did not fabricate this particular graphic to try to make this exact thing happen. Go to the thread that has all the funny pictures of you. Obviously they are not real They are computer enhanced/altered graphics. How hard would it be to do that in this case.

I think the personal attacks on Scott are a bit distasteful as well. I mean here is a guy that has done the EXACT same thing as our programmer friend and has donated a lot of his personal time to the community we all call WRXAtlanta.com. As I have said before, Scott has answered MANY questions for me personally as well as for the rest of the guys here on his own time and for not a dollar. That to me is one of the things I admire about SS. He loves what he does and he LOVES the Subaru!

As for the whole debate about the legitimacy of the evolutions of the Enginuity, I feel that everyone has hacked a bit. EcuTek obviously was not given the code by Subaru...at least not up front. If you see something once and think it is a good idea and incorporate it into an idea of your own that is different I really don't think it is stealing.

As for our new programmer friend, welcome to the site. I am sorry it is on such hostile territory right now and it probably seems like you are having to defend yourself. But I wanted to take the time and say welcome and thanks for coming here. Also, as a side note, thanks for serving in the world's greatest military. Both my grandfathers were pilots in the AF and I think had things gone a bit differently I would have been too!

 

I remembered Trey from Cobb accusing Colby of ripping off AP technology and asking for proof that he reversed engineered the ECU and this was his reply:

http://forums.nasioc.com/forums/showthread.php?p=14204135#post14204135

Some interesting threads of note:

First question about the Subaru ECU
http://forums.nasioc.com/forums/showthread.php?t=646449

EcuFlash proposal:
http://forums.nasioc.com/forums/showthread.php?t=686912

Looks like he might be considering commercial licensing which could indicate availability of support:
http://forums.nasioc.com/forums/showthread.php?p=14207760#post14207760

Looking through a couple of his past threads it also appears he often asked for free or cheap ECUs for further development or making the software compatible with other cars. Going by several of his posts he also seems well versed in embedded devices. It's not improbable that he reversed engineered it on his own.

 

Thanks for the links, chillwill. Colby said it much better than I could have.

I've been active in Colby's community for about a year and a half and know very little about him, and have only spoken with him via email on a couple of occasions. What I can say about him and his work is just speculation based that experience.

Colby is a very bright guy. The more technical of his posts on openecu.org which discuss the electronics in ECUs, communications protocols, designing the OpenPort, and the disassembly of ECUs are WAY above my head. He proved he has electronic engineering abilities by making the cable. I have absolutely no doubt in my mind that he is at least capable of having done the reverse engineering himself.

To my knowledge, Ecutek has never made any claim that Colby stole their work in the development. Rather, Cobb has. Colby's reply in that thread on nasioc explains it better than I could.

 

this was posted in Enginuity
http://www.enginuity.org/viewtopic.php?t=1069&highlight=cobb+hiring
So is this what i assume it is

 

One thing I neglected to mention before is I have no anti-sentiment for Cobb or Ecutek's products. I have no desire to hurt their sales. The point is to improve the market for the community. A lot of the guys want to see Cobb and Ecutek crash and burn, and I must admit, just the fact that I'm a part of something that has clearly cut in to Ecutek's sales gets a part of me off, on the whole I really don't feel that way.

I look at it like this. Ecutek sells licenses for $x, Enginuity is free. If someone wants to tune their car for free and chooses to do so with Enginuity, then introducing it into the community made it a better place for that one guy. If someone decides they like whatever about Ecutek more and decides to go ahead and pay that $x, the market is no worse off for that guy. If Ecutek were to stop offering what they offer, and that guy was forced to use Enginuity when he'd rather be paying Ecutek, the community has failed him.

 

Jared didn't you originally write Enginuity for yourself?

 

If I was a tuner I would have a problem with one thing. I wouldn't want my maps available to the public so that some idiot could try to load them and blow their engine. There are people like that everywhere. I personally know a friend that tunes DSM's with open source and someone got his maps from their buddy (who's car was tuned by this tuner) and ended up blowing his engine. He took the tuner who never tuned that car to court. Granted he lost but still that court time was money lost.