I call them "Soundscape Skills" - like "Relaxing Nature Sounds", "Ambient Sounds: Cricket Sounds", "Rain Sounds", etc. There's hundreds of them. On my Sonos One, perhaps only one in ten works properly. If a Soundscape Skill doesn't work properly, the symptom is that I hear nothing at all. Evidence seems to point to the fact that Alexa thinks that the Soundscape is playing, but nothing whatsoever is audible at any volume level. I tried dozens upon dozens of these late last night, and only found a handful which worked properly. Alexa otherwise seems to be performing perfectly well.
I am working with Sonos tech support on this, but since the diagnostic reports look absolutely fine, it's difficult for support to troubleshoot this problem. My question is, am I the only one with this symptomatology?
Soundscape Skills Not Functioning
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*FIXED* I was having the same problem with the soundscapes not playing. I tried saying "play [name of sound] in [name of room]" and it worked! I tried using words other than play (open, loop, etc) and it didn't work. Adding the name of the room is the key!
It actually does work only sometimes for me if you say something like Play X in Y
Thanks for this thread. Was frustrated by the lack of soundscape functionality too. Based on the insight that invoking the skill from an echo to execute on a Sonos one works, I tried this on my Sonos one (assigned the name "Kitchen" in the Alexa app):
"Alexa, play heavy rain sounds on kitchen"
Which works.
It's strange to refer to the Sonos one by name when you're querying that specific one, but hey, got my ambient sound back.
"Alexa, play heavy rain sounds on kitchen"
Which works.
It's strange to refer to the Sonos one by name when you're querying that specific one, but hey, got my ambient sound back.
I downloaded three of the Ambient Sounds (rain, ocean and rainforest) scapes and none of them worked - argh! - ....UNTIL reading the second/third post on this blog and started adding "playlist" at the end of each comment. So, "Alexa, play rain sounds playlist" - and hey presto - they all work! Hope that helps. Simple but effective - fingers crossed. 😉
Convinced the wife to upgrade to the Sonos One instead of picking up another Echo Dot or Echo 2nd generation. A couple days after getting it she mentions that it's broken. I did buy it via Amazon Warehouse deals, so I was hoping it wasn't actually broken, but she mentioned it wouldn't work with any of the meditation/white noise/soundscape skills she has used on our old Echo Dot or any new ones she tried.
I said a few commands to try some other skills. Reuters Flash Briefing, Jeopardy, and Heads-up all work without issue. Saying the command to start most of the 'soundscape' skills she installed resulted in nothing more than a flashing white light with no response from Alexa whatsoever. I was able to get one of them to open and list off all of the different sounds it can play, however when you ask it to actually play a specific sound, Alexa returns with just a flashing white light. Bummer.
There's a slight way around this was to ask Alexa to 'Play White Noise Sleep Therapy' which is an album on Amazon Music (included with Prime). That shuffled the album of relaxing noises/sounds.
I'd really like to get a skill to work for this. Has anyone found a 'soundscape' like skill that works with Sonos One?
I said a few commands to try some other skills. Reuters Flash Briefing, Jeopardy, and Heads-up all work without issue. Saying the command to start most of the 'soundscape' skills she installed resulted in nothing more than a flashing white light with no response from Alexa whatsoever. I was able to get one of them to open and list off all of the different sounds it can play, however when you ask it to actually play a specific sound, Alexa returns with just a flashing white light. Bummer.
There's a slight way around this was to ask Alexa to 'Play White Noise Sleep Therapy' which is an album on Amazon Music (included with Prime). That shuffled the album of relaxing noises/sounds.
I'd really like to get a skill to work for this. Has anyone found a 'soundscape' like skill that works with Sonos One?
I’m getting the same issue with my brand new Sonos One. Sleepsounds skills are not playing by, even though Alexa blinks and responds like she is starring the skill.
@Sonos: Will this be addressed?
@Sonos: Will this be addressed?
Hi, I'm in the UK and having the same issue. Haven't been able to find an ambient skins skill which will play on sonos one. No problem on my Echo Dot. Another annoying thing is that music alarms are not supported. On reading another forum, it seems this now works in the States but, unfortunately not on this side of the pond... Yet! Hope there's soon to be more functionality.
I am also having problems with all Alexa audio skills through my Sonos One, although I can go in another room to my Echo dot and tell it to play on the Sonos One and it will. When I speak directly to the Sonos One Alexa, she sets it up and then silence. Like others, I'm looking for guided meditations and ambient sounds. Any updates on when/if this will be resolved?
Same problem here Daily Dose doesnt work on Sonos one but it works on Echod dot 😞 I gonna return Sonos ONE :((
Same problem, added two "Ambient Sounds" skills and both are silent after Alexa's introduction. It would be a massive let down if Alexa's full functionality wasn't available on the Sonos One, especially considering the price
I can get “Ambient Sounds” like “Rain” to play on my Echo Dot, and tell Alexa to play it on “Master Bedroom” for example. On Dot, I can tell it to stop in an hour. On the Sonos, it shuts off after maybe 5 mins. I just can’t get it to Loop for some reason. Any suggestions? BTW, any other streamed content sent to Sonos plays just fine and stops as programmed. Odd, eh?! :8
I assigned the “Ambient Sounds” skills for Rain Sounds and Rain Forest sounds in the Alexa app. But I’m not sure where Alexa is pulling the music from in reality. I’m still learning how all this integrates. Im 3 days into this with Alexa - longer term Sonos user. Let’s hope resolution soon.
Adrienne... I am wondering if you are simply finding those sounds with Amazon music and not the skills. There are some soundscape like skill on Amazon music that are not a skill that will play.
Also, apologies. Forgot to update this thread.
Since I posted I have heard from both Sonos and Amazon. Actually Sonos gave me their theory / reason and I doubled back with Amazon to see if they heard the same.
At first I was told this fix would be sometimes in 2018 but the day after I chatted with someone on the Alexa team I was updated the fix should be sometime in early to mid January.
Not sure of the extent of the fix, etc. I appreciate finally having this however addressed, identified, etc.
Here is hoping it is a January fix indeed.
Also, apologies. Forgot to update this thread.
Since I posted I have heard from both Sonos and Amazon. Actually Sonos gave me their theory / reason and I doubled back with Amazon to see if they heard the same.
At first I was told this fix would be sometimes in 2018 but the day after I chatted with someone on the Alexa team I was updated the fix should be sometime in early to mid January.
Not sure of the extent of the fix, etc. I appreciate finally having this however addressed, identified, etc.
Here is hoping it is a January fix indeed.
Interestingly, if I ask Alexa to play Soundscapes via the Sonos One, but in another room on a standard Sonos Play One it works fine. For example, On the bedroom SonosOne I ask, "Alexa, play Rain Sounds in the Office" and it works.
If I request it to "play Rain Sounds in the bedroom (Sonos One)" from my Alexa Show, it plays!
It just won't play on the SonosOne itself when I request it from there.
So what is the resolution plan for this? I can't find that in here. Will Sonos support these functions or not? Not sure why I need a SonosOne. I could just use a Sonos PlayOne and an Echo Dot.
If I request it to "play Rain Sounds in the bedroom (Sonos One)" from my Alexa Show, it plays!
It just won't play on the SonosOne itself when I request it from there.
So what is the resolution plan for this? I can't find that in here. Will Sonos support these functions or not? Not sure why I need a SonosOne. I could just use a Sonos PlayOne and an Echo Dot.
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@lesliegolf - that's interesting what you have to say about the Sonos One being a Beta product. Because it wasn't so indicated on the Sonos website, I wasn't aware of that, but if that's indeed the case it doesn't make the situation any better - it makes it worse.
1. Beta or not, there's no substitute for basic functionality. To make up for a fork which is missing the two center tines by calling it a "Beta" product still doesn't cut it. It's still gotta be a working fork.
2. I've been a Beta tester, and I would have been a Beta tester for Sonos if I was offered the upfront opportunity. But sorry - I don't work for free. Only slaves do, which makes that point of view rather insulting to their customer base, yes?
3, Where is the online form to fill out with our perceptions of the Sonos One product in its Beta form? Or is it maybe actually *not* a true Beta product after all?
4. What I think I'm seeing is a turkey that wasn't cooked yet, and a company which couldn't help themselves from foisting it half-baked on consumers anyway - just in time for the Black Friday cash registers. Not ethical enough for me.
5. We are in perfect agreement that future Sonos customers can learn from our misfortunes by means of our conversations here, and I hope that happens.
1. Beta or not, there's no substitute for basic functionality. To make up for a fork which is missing the two center tines by calling it a "Beta" product still doesn't cut it. It's still gotta be a working fork.
2. I've been a Beta tester, and I would have been a Beta tester for Sonos if I was offered the upfront opportunity. But sorry - I don't work for free. Only slaves do, which makes that point of view rather insulting to their customer base, yes?
3, Where is the online form to fill out with our perceptions of the Sonos One product in its Beta form? Or is it maybe actually *not* a true Beta product after all?
4. What I think I'm seeing is a turkey that wasn't cooked yet, and a company which couldn't help themselves from foisting it half-baked on consumers anyway - just in time for the Black Friday cash registers. Not ethical enough for me.
5. We are in perfect agreement that future Sonos customers can learn from our misfortunes by means of our conversations here, and I hope that happens.
Well, this is listed as a Beta product and while I feel it shoulld not have been released or supported more effectively if they realized it was released with more issues than expected I plan to hang in for now and hope for the best. I’m just glad more and more issues are being documented by the user base to hopefully help those that run into the same thing and find these posts via a Google search.
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@lesliegolf - Dot --> Sonos Play:3 should be a good workaround, and it should function that way. Personally though, I'm just a little too disenchanted with Sonos to continue the relationship. Too bad, because, man, did it sound good! But they've got competition that's not far behind, and might just cost a little less. I'll soon find out.
IMHO Sonos had no idea this was an issue. It surely sounded like that when I talked to them. When I mentioned third party audio being an issue in general they seemed surprised.
Also IMHO Sonos poorly prepped their staff to handle this introduction. They also have borderline misleading advertising on their website as well.
While I can understand how things can happen unexpectedly (I was also part of the Frontier Fios changeover mess) I lack to understand how they are not at least trying to address issues, etc.
One person told me they cannot look into a known bug list because there were so many bugs.
This thing was simply rushed to the market too soon, advertised incorrectly and is being supported poorly but a group of nice people I feel were not educated enough to support it nor educated now to handle it's issues or simply told not to address them publicly.
It's listed as a Beta. So, I know what I signed up for. I however as you have also said would like to find out if they plan to support this.
When I am back home from the holidays I plan to test a Dot set up to a Play 3. If third party audio does not play to the Sonos Play 3 then I know this might be something a little bit more interesting.
Also IMHO Sonos poorly prepped their staff to handle this introduction. They also have borderline misleading advertising on their website as well.
While I can understand how things can happen unexpectedly (I was also part of the Frontier Fios changeover mess) I lack to understand how they are not at least trying to address issues, etc.
One person told me they cannot look into a known bug list because there were so many bugs.
This thing was simply rushed to the market too soon, advertised incorrectly and is being supported poorly but a group of nice people I feel were not educated enough to support it nor educated now to handle it's issues or simply told not to address them publicly.
It's listed as a Beta. So, I know what I signed up for. I however as you have also said would like to find out if they plan to support this.
When I am back home from the holidays I plan to test a Dot set up to a Play 3. If third party audio does not play to the Sonos Play 3 then I know this might be something a little bit more interesting.
+1
@sarjeah - yes, I get the same symptoms. Sometimes the "soundscape" skill doesn't have an Alexa introduction like you mention, but Alexa still responds normally - her light blinks a few times and she doesn't announce any kind of error. But nothing plays.
What they still didn't tell you was an expected time frame within which they anticipate that the problem will be solved. Based on your interaction, there's no telling whether they even intend to fix the problem at all. At least Amazon had a pretty cogent response for you - they literally just gave up on me at the third escalation point, although this was perhaps about a week ago. The third level escalation tech read through the history, then literally just told me, well, sorry, there's nothing we can do. Contact Sonos Tech Support - and that was that.
Meanwhile, on Sonos' tech side, I'm not getting any answers and they just unilaterally closed my ticket a few days ago without consulting me. Like I said, I feel like a mislead consumer - I'm just going to refuse delivery on the new one due to arrive today and investigate a possible purchase from one of their competitors.
What they still didn't tell you was an expected time frame within which they anticipate that the problem will be solved. Based on your interaction, there's no telling whether they even intend to fix the problem at all. At least Amazon had a pretty cogent response for you - they literally just gave up on me at the third escalation point, although this was perhaps about a week ago. The third level escalation tech read through the history, then literally just told me, well, sorry, there's nothing we can do. Contact Sonos Tech Support - and that was that.
Meanwhile, on Sonos' tech side, I'm not getting any answers and they just unilaterally closed my ticket a few days ago without consulting me. Like I said, I feel like a mislead consumer - I'm just going to refuse delivery on the new one due to arrive today and investigate a possible purchase from one of their competitors.
This was a reply to me from Amazon. Please keep in mind this was before the last software update so some of these things are now working:
**** As of now, Flash Briefings, Sports Updates, Audible, Audio skills and eBooks are not supported. This is the reason that the Ambient Noise skills are not working on your Sonos speaker with Alexa built in.
So..... Any Audio Skill that is not the Flash Briefing or the Sonos Skill will probably not work.
Download Guided Meditation. It's the perfect example. Alexa introduces it with her voice and even says "here we go" then it's silence. All of the noises not her voice simply are not delivered even though she thinks it is.
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@sarjeah - Yeah, I want to get those to work too. Well, I tried dozens and dozens of these "Soundscapes" that day, so I really don't remember, but in a sense it doesn't matter, and let me tell you why. So some of these which initially worked ok at first became broken before the end of the day - they *no longer* worked. So the problem got worse instead of better.
Read what I had to say in my post which starts, "Just sent the following to Sonos Support after working with them unsuccessfully . . ." I'm *not* happy. This is core, fundamental functionality we're talking about here, and Sonos Tech Support wasn't even told that there were known problems with this sort of thing? I feel I've been mislead as a consumer, so I'm refusing delivery the new one due to arrive today, and accepting the full refund instead. I've had enough - this is simply unacceptable - these products cost $200 but they simply don't work. Not even close.
Read what I had to say in my post which starts, "Just sent the following to Sonos Support after working with them unsuccessfully . . ." I'm *not* happy. This is core, fundamental functionality we're talking about here, and Sonos Tech Support wasn't even told that there were known problems with this sort of thing? I feel I've been mislead as a consumer, so I'm refusing delivery the new one due to arrive today, and accepting the full refund instead. I've had enough - this is simply unacceptable - these products cost $200 but they simply don't work. Not even close.
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@lesliegolf - I might have something for you about that, although it looks like you've solved your own problem already. This guy does a great YouTube video concerning potential problems with rooms-in-the-home naming conventions: https://youtu.be/PpF9F3-OQUE
@thenekkidtruth. Yes Soundscape skills . we are having the same issue. No update so far. I sent a ticket so hopefully I can get a response back sooner than later. I just want it to be able to play rain , waterfalls and etc when I ask it to. Which skill did you get to work ? It's doing Spotify and games like jeopardy but not Soundscape Skills
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@sarjeah - Ok, it looks we're talking about the same thing. I call them "Soundscapes" - sleep and meditation apps, and many others that are similar. Here's what I sent my Sonos service tech about those three days ago:
Ok, here's the latest - I'm calling these "Soundscape Skills" by the way, just to synchronize our vocabulary. I must have tried fifty or sixty of these kinds of skills last night, and only met with success in about one out of every ten or so. The rest demonstrated the usual symptom - evidence indicates that Alexa thought that the app was running properly, but I could hear nothing at any volume.
I also posted a question on the forums - I'm curious to see if I'm the only one who's experiencing this. Meanwhile, anything new on your end? What's the next step in the process?
Ok, here's the latest - I'm calling these "Soundscape Skills" by the way, just to synchronize our vocabulary. I must have tried fifty or sixty of these kinds of skills last night, and only met with success in about one out of every ten or so. The rest demonstrated the usual symptom - evidence indicates that Alexa thought that the app was running properly, but I could hear nothing at any volume.
I also posted a question on the forums - I'm curious to see if I'm the only one who's experiencing this. Meanwhile, anything new on your end? What's the next step in the process?
Routines are different than the soundscape skills, but, I am also having issues with routines which i might start a different post about. It's struggling to execute some lighting commands with some words to start a routine but not other words. I simply changed the names of the routines. Dot downstairs does not have the same issue.
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