Sonos, Alexa and local NAS stored music

Yeah, because hanging out down the street to watch you get in the car and leave is so much harder than hacking Amazon to figure out when someone isn't playing music. Jebus Christmas, do you people think about what you write? :8

Why would a thief waste time staking out a house when they can use data mining to get the info they need? Thieves are very sensitive to time management and return on investment.

Dear Lord, please tell me you are not being serious. :8

Yeah, because hanging out down the street to watch you get in the car and leave is so much harder than hacking Amazon to figure out when someone isn't playing music. Jebus Christmas, do you people think about what you write? :8

Why would a thief waste time staking out a house when they can use data mining to get the info they need? Thieves are very sensitive to time management and return on investment.

Dear Lord, please tell me you are not being serious. :8

I could say that all of my posts are absolutely dead serious... but that would by lying. 😃

As far as I know, Sonos only supports Plex on a local server, not the cloud, and quite frankly, the Plex implementation is terrible and Plex basically abandoned it soon after it launched.

Plex implementation is fine. Don't know what rubbish you are spouting about saying implementation is terrible. Works same or better than the crappy local
Library definition in sonos app, and at least we aren't crippled by the 65k music limit with the sonos default local library

As far as I know, Sonos only supports Plex on a local server, not the cloud, and quite frankly, the Plex implementation is terrible and Plex basically abandoned it soon after it launched.

Plex implementation is fine. Don't know what rubbish you are spouting about saying implementation is terrible. Works same or better than the crappy local
Library definition in sonos app, and at least we aren't crippled by the 65k music limit with the sonos default local library

Your opinion is decidedly in the minority. But to each his own.

Am I interpreting correctly what Alexa/Sonos integration can and cannot achieve?

I have just bought an Echo Dot and gone through the set up...

1 It CAN play a Radio Station in any of my Sonos devices, start and stop and control volume.
2 It CANT play anything from my local NAS ( this makes the whole thing useless to me)
3 It CANT play anything from Napster which is the only streaming service I have.
4 It CANT play anything from my Sonos playlist ( the playlists are mostly from the NAS, and some mixed NAS/Napster)

Can an expert confirm on 2-4 please.

The problem with this type of modern development methodology is that there isn’t a definition of what it should do? What I would call a Functional Spec. Where would I find this definition, as I’m not sure whether it’s because I don’t know how to get it to do something, or it just doesn’t do it!

It cannot initiate playback from anything except Amazon's music services, Pandora, SiriusXM, iHeart, and TuneIn, with Spotify coming soon. You can initiate playback of all other services via the Sonos app and then control playback pause, play, skip, volume, ask what's playing, etc. via Alexa.

See here for more details:

https://sonos.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/4343?_ga=2.109578245.1024760305.1507348659-107072400.1489101718

Remember this Alexa implementation is currently in beta, and thus subject to change (hopefully for the better) as it gets closer to general release.

The problem with this type of modern development methodology is that there isn’t a definition of what it should do? What I would call a Functional Spec. Where would I find this definition, as I’m not sure whether it’s because I don’t know how to get it to do something, or it just doesn’t do it!

Amazon is the owner of the API, which Sonos is first to use, but Denon and several of HK's other brands will soon integrate, as well. Amazon isn't sharing their specs publicly. Maybe if you ask them real nice...

Or, you can sign up for access here. Just be prepared to prove you're representing a company that's building smart speakers.

https://alexa.au1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_eJdai0Nm0gwLsQ5

OK thanks for the clarification - I’m afraid it’s pretty useless IMO, oh well put the Echo Dot on eBay......

OK thanks for the clarification - I’m afraid it’s pretty useless IMO, oh well put the Echo Dot on eBay......

That is a pretty fatalistic approach when something is still in beta and Sonos has stated it will be improving with every beta release. But to each his own.

OK thanks for the clarification - I’m afraid it’s pretty useless IMO, oh well put the Echo Dot on eBay......
Where the NAS play is concerned you can do all the subsequent things via voice for managing what is playing - volume/pause/stop/restart. So that is a plus over what you had before, so that is some use that wasn't there before surely? All you have to still do is initiate music play and if you use long playlists that remain in use over multiple listening sessions, that is a small task.

From what I have read elsewhere, given the architecture of Alexa+Sonos, it will be a long time before voice controlled local NAS play beyond that will happen - if ever it does. Pity, but local NAS users are also getting to be a minority in the user base so giving just them more than what they get today - which is a lot when one thinks about it - seems to be a remote possibility.