The worst situation I've encountered is after a large conference when everyone is leaving the hotel at once. An elevator quickly fills up on the way down, but then wastes time stopping at every subsequent floor with a call, even though no one else can fit inside. At each floor the elevator stops, the doors open, the waiting people see it's already packed, the doors close, and this repeats on the next 15 floors before finally reaching the bottom where everyone gets off. If the algorithm could know an elevator is completely full and only stop at its destination floors rather than every floor along the way with a call, it would be far more efficient.
I have seen elevators, usually in a big building with a lot of elevators, that do act that way (presumably using weight sensors?). I’ve read that some elevators also have a “kid mode” that does the opposite: if some kid pushes all the buttons as they leave (just for the lolz), the elevator cancels the calls.
theodorejb · · focus · HN ↗
wrs · · focus · HN ↗