A truck tablet platform is the operating system on the tablet in a truck's cab, on which a trucking company runs its own apps for its drivers. It is sold mainly in the United States, where long-haul trucks usually carry a fixed tablet in the cab. So this page describes how it is used there.
In the United States, a long-haul driver may spend a week on the road, and does most of the job's paperwork from the cab. The driver needs several apps. One gives navigation planned for trucks, which avoids low bridges and roads closed to trucks. One is an electronic logbook. One holds the documents for each load. Another shows messages from the dispatcher, the person in the office who assigns loads to drivers. Each of these used to come on its own device, from a different company. A truck tablet platform runs all of them on one tablet, and lets the trucking company install apps of its own.
One app is required by law. American rules limit how long a driver may drive. In general, a driver may drive no more than 11 hours within a 14-hour working day, and must then rest. Since 2017, most trucks must record these hours with an electronic logging device (ELD), which is connected to the truck's engine and records when the truck moves. On a tablet platform, the ELD is an app on the tablet, linked to the engine through a small box in the truck's diagnostic port.
The platform controls what the driver can do, and when. While the truck is moving, it locks the screen to a simple driving view, with navigation and spoken messages only, so that the driver is not distracted. When the truck stops, the other apps open. The platform also reads the truck's telematics data, such as its speed, location and fuel use, and passes it to each app that needs it. In the office, the company uses the platform to install and update apps on every tablet.
Take, for example, a driver hauling frozen food from Kansas City to Denver. When the truck stops at the customer's warehouse, the screen unlocks. The delivery app shows the customer's dock instructions. The driver photographs the signed delivery receipt with the tablet, and the app sends it to the office at once, so the company can bill the customer the same day. The logbook app shows that the driver has 2 hours of driving left today. So the dispatcher, working in the company's transportation management system, sends the tablet a short next load nearby.
A truck tablet platform is close to a fleet operating system, which manages a fleet's in-cab apps and devices from the cloud. The tablet platform is the software on the device in the cab. The data it collects goes to the company's fleet management system. Indian trucks rarely carry a fixed tablet. Indian owners and drivers use apps on their own phones instead, such as a trucking app for owners. Some of the American platforms are built by engineers in Chennai.