Enthusiast I

Take Heed Sonos Devs

Forum|Forum|8 years ago
November 3, 2017
73 replies
2134 views

While you sit in your conference rooms and debate the 8.x app with corporate speak sentences like "They will get used to it" and "This happens every major upgrade" and "Scale-able, cross-platform modern blah blah blah.....".
One thing that has never happened before with my Sonos house happened last night. And it is important you realize the significance.

I had three couples over for drinks and I put on one of my playlists and then I turned the ipad over and placed it under my bar. I did it without thinking - it just seemed less distracting that way.

This morning i did think about it however. I had never done that before. I tend to hand off the Ipad and let guests marvel at my wonderful Sonos system. I let them pick music from the seemingly endless inventory of tunes from Google and Apple. Soon old songs are played that bring back great memories - people sing and some might even dance.
It almost always turns into a "So what is this Sonos thing?".

Last night. That did not happen.
The new interface is just confusing enough for new users that i have to give a tutorial I didn't feel like giving a tutorial.
The aesthetic is a bit too glaring and, in my opinion, not as attractive as it once was.

Your app is more than a tool. It is a showpiece. And we, the owners of Sonos dearly love to show it off. The speakers, yeah, they the Wow factor when the rich sound fills the house but when a new user touches the app and finds any song at the end of their fingertips, you can almost see the excitement in their eyes.

So while we can debate endlessly of 8.x being intuitive or not intuitive or 8.x being an evolutionary step forward or backward, one thing is a stone cold fact: six people did not fall in love with Sonos last night.

And THAT is something you should worry about.

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K

Kumar

Your call. On the other hand, if everyone dissenting was in agreement with everyone else, why is more than one dissenter needed?:-). And what's left to discuss?

U

User103951

Renowned Enthusiast I

At even the largest companies, it is pretty common for an extremely small group of people (or even a single individual) to make major decisions on UI design that devs are required to follow. Ideally that group or person is listening closely to user-feedback, observing users actually interacting with the software, and is "dogfooding" it. (Internal usage of the product first, within the company.) Easy for that not to happen though, for a variety of reasons.

Indeed. I'd be very surprised if any user testing has taken place for version 8. And if it did, some pointy haired higher-up must have decided to ignore the feedback.

Looks like Sonos is trying to move the app to try to adhere to Apple's "Human Interface Guidelines". See https://developer.apple.com/ios/human-interface-guidelines/overview/themes/ I'd be curious to hear what someone experienced in developing using these guidelines thinks of the new app.

While that's clearly what they are trying to do - and in doing so happily ignore android users - whoever is doing so has very little practical experience with usability.

If you look at the navigation guidelines for example it clearly states users should have a clear path and that it should be fast and easy to get where you want.
https://developer.apple.com/ios/human-interface-guidelines/app-architecture/navigation/

There's a clear consensus however that this has not been achieved, and that the navigation is cumbersome and inefficient (needless extra clicks, not sure where to go next, people being confused between the room selection and configuration, etc).

The reason for this is fairly obvious. Sonos decided to use a standard control (the tabbar) without properly questioning if it was fit for purpose (as quite some issues are a direct result of that choice). The guidelines clearly state though that you should only do so when possible, meaning it allows you to achieve a clear path, that's fast and easy to use, etc.

So if you can not achieve a user friendly app design with the standard controls you should look for something else (e.g almost every audio app uses a playbar although that isn't standard either). The previous navigation - warts and all - clearly struck a better balance in this regard (by using a standard android control).

BCM

...
Thanks, it is here that I bow out of the conversation and this forum. As it with my postings about the v8 app I repeatedly said that one’s own viewpoint is just that. What *I* hear is what I hear, what *I* see is what I see, what *I* feel is what I feel.

If my personal opinion is odious, so be it. However I don’t need to be told by others what I should think, feel, see or hear. I have only been around these forums a few weeks to realise there are 3 individuals who feel the need to chime in on almost every thread; they effectively act as bullys who put down any dissent in the ranks. Either way this is not a chilled or friendly place to hang out. You guys are welcome to it. cheerio

Your personal opinion is fine, and acceptable, but when you try to push your personal opinion as the end all/be all, that's where it becomes odious. Why is your opinion any better than anyone else's? That's the problem with your statements, as evidenced by you hiding your iPad from your guests because YOU don't like something they've never even seen before, effectively preventing THEM from even forming an opinion. That, sir, is the definition of odious.

As for hearing, I personally can't hear the difference between FLAC and a 320 MP3 on ANY equipment. Does that mean I need to get my hearing checked? No. And I'm fine with saving the disk space by storing my CDs as 320 MP3s. That's MY choice. Not yours.

A

andrewmk

Renowned Enthusiast II

...
Thanks, it is here that I bow out of the conversation and this forum. As it with my postings about the v8 app I repeatedly said that one’s own viewpoint is just that. What *I* hear is what I hear, what *I* see is what I see, what *I* feel is what I feel.

If my personal opinion is odious, so be it. However I don’t need to be told by others what I should think, feel, see or hear. I have only been around these forums a few weeks to realise there are 3 individuals who feel the need to chime in on almost every thread; they effectively act as bullys who put down any dissent in the ranks. Either way this is not a chilled or friendly place to hang out. You guys are welcome to it. cheerio

Your personal opinion is fine, and acceptable, but when you try to push your personal opinion as the end all/be all, that's where it becomes odious. Why is your opinion any better than anyone else's? That's the problem with your statements, as evidenced by you hiding your iPad from your guests because YOU don't like something they've never even seen before, effectively preventing THEM from even forming an opinion. That, sir, is the definition of odious.

As for hearing, I personally can't hear the difference between FLAC and a 320 MP3 on ANY equipment. Does that mean I need to get my hearing checked? No. And I'm fine with saving the disk space by storing my CDs as 320 MP3s. That's MY choice. Not yours.

Just passing through to say you got part of your posting of me mixed up with someone else. And I agree with you — it is your choice to listen to what you want. I said that right from the off. I keep saying it. Everyone’s opinion is their own — on anything and everything. Search my few postings and most are defending those who have dared raise their voice and been put down by the sanctimonious few. I see a handful on here who see theirs as the One True Way and make sure it’s heard on every thread. It was Chicks who said my opinion was laughable and Kumar who said my opinion was odious. Not because I told them what they should be listening to, but because I said I personally prefer lossless formats. Hence my comment about bullying. And that really Really is my last posting on any subject — this really is not a nice place to hang out. Just wanted to clear my name.

jgatie

Yeah, because telling people to get their ears checked and their hearing is "seriously screwed" if they can't tell the difference isn't telling people what they should think, feel, or hear, it's really the epitome of welcome and inviting . . . :8

Per usual, a person experiencing pushback on their bullying ways projects it onto others. Diversity of opinion goes both ways, sir. Only one person is lobbying for the shutdown of opinions here, and it isn't your so called "sanctimonious few".

K

Kumar

Kumar who said my opinion was odious. .

Also for the record, I said that generalisations are odious and explained why what you said was a generalisation. I have not seen any rebuttal of that explanation yet. That could lead to some progress, with a change of views possible on either side.

And asking others to get their hearing checked is obnoxious - no two ways about that.

chicks

Also for the record, there are many free services that stream music at ridiculously low bitrates, like 48kbps. That's fine for sportscasts, but for music, the artifacts are glaringly noticeable, including to these ears. Once transparency is reached, though, by definition the artifacts are no longer apparent. Streams at 320kbps mp3, and 256kbps AAC, are transparent. They meet every definition of High Fidelity. No one can hear the difference between them and uncompressed in controlled, double-blind tests, with a few well known exceptions.

M

mwiseman

Enthusiast II

Per usual, a person experiencing pushback on their bullying ways projects it onto others. Diversity of opinion goes both ways, sir. Only one person is lobbying for the shutdown of opinions here, and it isn't your so called "sanctimonious few".

Wow, that is rich coming from you.

B

BurtBushell

Renowned Enthusiast II

While you sit in your conference rooms and debate the 8.x app with corporate speak sentences like "They will get used to it" and "This happens every major upgrade" and "Scale-able, cross-platform modern blah blah blah.....".
One thing that has never happened before with my Sonos house happened last night. And it is important you realize the significance.

I had three couples over for drinks and I put on one of my playlists and then I turned the ipad over and placed it under my bar. I did it without thinking - it just seemed less distracting that way.

How does one really respond to the author of this post.

Let me understand this......Sonos' developers should take note of a dire situation because of your decision to shield 6 friends from the controller update????? Seriously.

Look I hear some of the concerns about the update. I also cannot say that I truly prefer the current update. What I do know is that I find no great difficulty using it.

But these posts!!!!!!

(1) Play 1, (1) Play 3, (2) Play 5s Gen 1, (1) Play 5 Gen 2, (1) Connect Amp powering a pair of Wharfedale Diamond 10.1, (2) Echo Dots.

jgatie

Wow, that is rich coming from you.

Could you show me the place where I've lobbied for the shutdown of opinions? Where I've claimed the victim? Where I call others names and hurl insults and then don't accept the same in kind? Where I've attacked the poster and not what they post?

Good luck finding them.

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