Official Linux Support

What about ZX Spectrum?

That 1.5% of the market that is Linux users are using 100 different Linux distributions, and many different versions of them, plus many different desktops so the poor Sonos coders would have to have many hundreds of packages to maintain to keep us all happy. If they played favorites the screaming would be worse than what they get for having no support.

But he is really determined to know because he "wants to hear from the business" 😃

I use Sonos for my business. All our machines run Linux, and it's pretty irritating to have to run to a tablet or phone to adjust our music. I mean, Spotify can do it, and I can even control my Sonos speakers from Spotify, provided I'm streaming from Spotity.. Would certainly be nice to use sonos directly for our music library.

How about running the Windows desktop controller app in a VM? Not as ‘easy’ as running a native app grsnted, but likely to be the most viable option for the foreseeable future I’d expect.

Another option that I prefer to a VM is to just run a Windows system on another box, pretty much anything that Windows will run on will do. Add a VNC server to Windows and then use your Linux VNC client to open a window showing the Windows box screen.

It does waste a bit of power but it is the least intrusive Linux option I've found so far.

Possibly doing something similar using a tablet as the VNC or other remote console application would work but I haven't investigated that yet.

The 1.5% figure (2.5% according to https://www.w3counter.com/globalstats.php?year=2018&month=8, still small but adding up to hundreds of thousands of users) is deceptive because OS/X and Android are both built on essentially the same kernel as Linux. So SONOS has already done 95% of the work to support native Linux. I even suspect that the SONOS code developers probably use Linux in house. The argument from Stanley_4 is spurious because just two binary distributions (rpm, deb) will support almost all Linux distros in native mode. Plus there is now the whole flatpak, snap or Appimage approach, where a single distribution supports every system, similar to Android apps. So, a SONOS distribution for Linux would not be challenging to compile from the existing OS/X or Android code-base, and trivially easy to distribute. That's why it's a "business" decision. It's not based on genuine technical barriers, but on business calculations, as jgatie tacitly states. It's regrettable, since Linux users are typically early-adopters, mavens and powerful networkers. Has anyone at SONOS read The Tipping Point?

MacOS is based on BSD, not Linux. Similar, yes... the same, no.

And it doesn't matter anyway now. Sonos has opened their API to the world, so anyone can create things to control Sonos via their API. So someone could easily write their own Linux controller for Sonos, and have it function through Sonos' API. That likely means that internet access would be needed, as I believe it's a cloud-based API, but at least it would be a native Linux controller.

I'm not an apps developer, but I thought that all android/apple apps need to be built through the respective SDKs that the respective companies provide. In other words, although the phones are based on linux, apps are never coded directly against linux...if that makes sense. Again, could be wrong about this.

As well, smart phones have many features that PCs do not, and vice versa. The screen size is different, lock screen controls, etc. I don't think android/iOS apps can really be that easily ported over. As a case in point, Sonos can't even run on older versions of android and iOS, so it would be safe to assume it' utilizing features only available on more recent releases of the OS.

As far as their being a Tipping Point, I'm not following how including linux support is going to be a game changer. It's very unlikley that linux support is really going to drive a big increase in sales, unless it somehow pretty much guaranteed all linux users would suddenly go out and buy a Sonos. However, I do think Sonos is very aware that little things can make a big difference. They saw the market change drasitically with voice control. The latest annoucements seem to be tied towards being a favorite choice amoungst professional installers, something it doesn't look like other smart speakers are really focusing on.

Targeting RPM or Deb as an install file format will make a program available to most systems. However available and easy to install are not the same thing. Sorting dependencies and such is not a very simple thing to do when trying to support a wide range of distributions.

I'd be happy as a clam if Sonos did a Linux client but I'm not holding my breath.

Great comments; thanks all. About Tipping Point, @melvimbe, Gladwell's idea isn't that the key players (maven, etc.) all go out and by the Nike shoes. It's that the complex relationship between these players creates a perfect storm of public opinion. It's everyone else who buys the shoes/novel/Sonos. It's the maven+networker+early-adopter combination that generates new behaviours in the general public. I genuinely do think the Linux user community plays such a role, though it would be hard to quantify it.

And it doesn't matter anyway now. Sonos has opened their API to the world

Please show me this API. I have seen articles claiming this, but no actual link to any API. The last time this was claimed (for Crestron I think) it was some crappy secret API that had close to no features.

Please show me this API. I have seen articles claiming this, but no actual link to any API. The last time this was claimed (for Crestron I think) it was some crappy secret API that had close to no features.
Tomorrow is the day...

https://developer.sonos.com/

At last! Docs look nice, but there's nothing there that i can't do already via the UPnP APIs I use today. in fact the huge omission is the ability to list and play anything other than Favorites, which is as I understand it the big problem with the Crestron integration.

I very much doubt this will ever happen. I imagine most people control their sonos system using either phone or tablet - who wants to have a pc next to every speaker when there is a controller available in your pocket.
There is https://github.com/pascalopitz/unoffical-sonos-controller-for-linux which I have tried and seemed ok. However I just use my phone rather than my linux pc

I'm a Linux desktop user as well, with a Connect under my monitor hooked to my computer's 2.1 amp.
If anything, being high salaried techies, linux users would be a disproportionately large slice of the sonos userbase.
And in the wider world (discounting linux in the form of android... which makes linux the most popular OS in the world) desktop Linux is generally as popular as MacOS.
Most of the people I work with use Linux on their work and home systems and many are also Sonos owners.

Noson ( http://janbar.github.io/noson-app/ ) is the desktop controller some are using... though most are using android phones.

I tried both the Unofficial Controller and the NoSon from above, both seem to work.

I started with the NoSon but I found the frustrating to install (requires FlatPak) and get working and then I had music service registration issues so I gave the other a try. If you are interested in how Sonos communicates this is a great option, turn on debugging and it shows a wealth of information. Tee the output to a log file, a 1000 line terminal window scrollback isn't going to be enough.

I haven't gotten as far with the Unofficial one but it is a lot easier to install as it uses AppImage and just works on a lot of distributions.

I read funny things. 100 packages to maintain? usually 2 types of packages: RPM & DEB, but the software remains the same. Else flatpack/snap packages are also a solution.
Secondly: there are a lot moe linux devices in the world than Windows devices. A lot more. Even on Azure, there are more Linux machines than Windows machines.
Also, on chromebooks for example , which run a linux kernel, it is now also possible to run Linux apps.
On the other hand, sonos offers a client for Mac..indeed..for mac...there are a LOT less Mac devices than Linux devices.

Check out the latest WINE implementation for Sonos Desktop Controller v9.2 that I just added (10-30-18):
https://appdb.winehq.org/objectManager.php?sClass=version&iId=37325

Yes, WINE is not a native Linux solution but IMHO until Sonos devs port their controller implementing the Sonos developed app in WINE is preferable to the various homegrown apps.