Sonos App

Thanks @Airgetlam , I did actually mention specifics higher up in this thread.

I can confirm that when i said Sonos had ‘virtually abandoned’ the desktop app i meant that it had abandoned any development work on it and was not supporting most admin functions on it.  So my point (not very well expressed) was that however valid any criticisms might be, they aren’t going to be addressed.

FWIW, I agree that the search isn't great on the mobile app, but i have learned to work with its limitations.  The ‘universal search’ gets me what I want reasonably quickly now.  I cannot comment much on the desktop app as I haven’t used it in years.  I have genuinely abandoned it (apart from a brief experiment just now).  The mobile app I find otherwise pretty easy to use.

Having just experimented with dragging tracks into the queue it seems to work fine on my PC controller.  Maybe the Mac controller is different.  Right-clicking to bring up context menus works well too - maybe that doesn’t feature on the Mac version?   It still isn’t going to tempt me back to using the desktop app.

So, @tiaskillen , I am not sure we have very different views on the search capabilities.  I cannot reproduce your other criticisms of the Mac app on the PC version.  But my main point in my previous posts was not to disagree with your analysis, just to say that I felt there was absolutely zero chance of any changes in response.

P.S. as an experiment, on tbe mobile app it took me less than 10 seconds to find Ocean by Goldfrapp and to have it playing. 

In the computer app search in Spotify - Artists - Goldfrapp - Top tracks -sixth song is Ocean. Only diffrecence with the iPhone app is that the iPhone app combines sources (i.e. Google Music and Spotify). Both do not have the possibility to search for a song by an artist. That would be good, but the computer app does not differ from the mobile app in this respect.

I think this is key point.  Some systems do allow artist / track searches but Sonos doesn’t - so you just accept that the route is to search for the artist then the song.  99% of the time you get what you want easily.

Actually such limitations are with the service back-end, not with Sonos.

Deezer, for instance, allows for compound searches so “Ocean Goldfrapp” -- or indeed “Goldfrapp Ocean” -- immediately zeroes in on the required track.

I have to agree with everything said here- the Sonos App is awful, unreliable, regularly loses connection with Spotify and Amazon, loses some of the speakers around the house, drops the music during playback. And the interface is woeful. A+ sound quality tied to a D- app. 

Hmm. Comments to the interface aside, to understand the system better: the app doesn’t loose connection with Spotify and Amazon, nor does it loose some of the speakers around the house, or drops the music during playback. The app is just a remote control for your system. Your system does this, probably caused by troubles with your wifi. You could contact Sonos about this.

Yes, agreed, plainly network issues - classic symptoms..

Network issues would not explain why the app freezes, why it often fails to load and why I often see grey bars instead of text. The sound doesn’t seem to drop out when I connect via Airplay, only when accessing music through the Sonos app.  My Wi-fi performs superbly in every area of my house, I’ve tested it.  Excusing poor performance by saying the app is only a remote control is nonsense; if it offers facilities like access to Spotify or Amazon, one should expect them to work. The sound quality is great; the interface is woeful.