Show HN: Nissan's Leaf app doesn't have a home screen widget so I made my own

Just like OBD, I think api access to data like this should be open to the car user. If the manufacturer is taking the data ( as they do with my renault zoe) then it should be available to the end user at a standard API which is available across all manufacturers, so if you change car you can just point your setup at a new endpoint with new credentials and all the endpoints and responses are standard, just like OBD2 is

(yes I know manufacturer tools go deeper but that's another issue)

In the EU, this may soon be covered by the Data Act [1]. It'd be interesting to see if other continents will benefit as well, similar to how cookie banners are now a global thing.

[1] https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/data-act

Daring to call cookie banners a benefit.

You should be able to intercept inspect and modify any data in any device you own. I’m not even sure what the reason for locking things down really is anymore. It isn’t any more secure as hackers breach into these things routinely anyhow, and everyone running the same software expands the risk envelope and reward of hacking greatly. It turns power users away who might have added to sales just buying your product to use as a dummy sensor for some other purpose vs the ones marketing come up with.

So it is arguably more dangerous and leads to fewer sales. But again businesses don’t take positions that are rational if they can take an irrational position that every other business in the sector also takes and therefore easily justify to shareholders without having to present actual numbers they might reject anyhow.