Feature Request - Sonos System Backup Function

Hi All

Like ​@Stanley_4, I was thinking last night that it would probably be easier just to have a local file act as a backup, and just for Favourites and Playlists - the two things that take the most work to restore without a backup. In addition, for those with 2 or more systems in other houses, they could just copy all the favs and playlists from the home system to the holiday home system, quick and easy. Maybe it could be added to S1 controllers (I don’t think it would need any change to firmware on the speakers, so possibly doable) too, for the same reason.

That could al least be a quick win, phase 1, with possible further embellishments during future development cycles. 👍

There’s already a backup stored on every speaker.

Anyone who factory resets all of their Sonos devices at the same time deserves the consequences.

Hi ​@Mr. T 

Somewhat harsh. 😅

This discussion came about due to a relatively new user who only has one speaker, and was asked to reset it by a technical support agent in need of more training. They lost all their playlists and favourites as a result. Obviously, the agent involved will get additional training, but the situation prompted ​@UKMedia to suggest backups as a feature request.

Would there be a performance benefit, besides backup utility, for storing this data locally or in the cloud?  For example, if a user is on the app,  a locally stored copy of the playlist could be accessed faster than making a call to the speaker(s) to retrieve that info?  Although, it sounds good in theory, I’m thinking it’s probably not a good idea. In most systems, there’s probably not a lot of time savings.  Of course there is the potential of sync issues between the two data sources (they will surely have to sync very often), and it complicates the logic in the code slightly.  A single source of truth is probably still the best option.

I was going to suggest that there could maybe some sort version of reset that retains personal settings, but clears everything else?  I don’t know what that looks like or when it would actually be useful.  The only time I’ve used factory reset is when a speaker is leaving my system, or during an initial setup that’s seem to go off the rails and wanted to just start over.  

Hi ​@melvimbe 

I would assume any time saving there would be in the region of 10s of milliseconds, or less. It depends on the network, of course. Syncing would be an additional headache, yes.

A reset of a Sonos speaker is much like the reset of an Android device - with different partitions set for system and home, the home (user) partition can be erased so that all user data is removed forever, but the system not only remains, but stays up to date too (unlike with, say, a Windows System Restore point which basically does the opposite, rolling back system files while leaving user files alone, or a reinstall of the OS from disk, which erases everything and does not maintain any system updates).

So, no, I don’t think so. Technically possible, I suppose, with further partitions, but it adds a layer of complexity to something which should just be a “lets clear everything to see if it helps” kind of a function.

I also see little benefit in a ‘backup’ of Sonos ‘system’ settings, maybe that's why it hasn’t been added as a feature already.

I do see requirement for the ‘user’ settings to be stored outside of the players, ie stored in the Sonos ‘user’ account, I am sure this will be on the road map.

I would assume a relatively new user who only has one speaker would have very little to ‘backup’? A new user would have existing playlists stored in their existing streaming services account(s), and no requirement for Sonos playlists.

Its the old school legacy users using Sonos playlists that would be more impacted by loss of playlists built up over a number of years stored on the players.

Hi ​@craigski 

I guess I meant “relatively new” in the sense that they only had one speaker, and was therefore not overly familiar with resetting and adding products, and what the dangers are. I didn’t check how long they have had their speaker for.

I did get the impression that they had put quite a bit of work into making some playlists, though.

You might be right there, although anyone wanting a single playlist of tracks from different music services will have no choice but to use Sonos playlists.

You are correct though - it will largely be long-time users that this would benefit - certainly the most.

For a person who has homes in different regions, using a backup from another region to configure a system may introduce some interesting issues with accessing the services. And, of course, there will be the usual issues with Room names and players that may not exist in the ‘other’ system.

Right, a factory reset doesn’t change what firmware version you are on or anything like that.  I was thinking that perhaps the user data partition could be further segmented out separate favorties, playlists, EQ settings etc, from the more network specific data (Wifi credentials, channel) or perhaps even other devices they are bonded to, the rest of the rooms in the network, etc.  That latter group is generally what people are wanting to delete when they are troubleshooting an issue. 

 Agreed.  As well, in the vast majority of cases, issues are best resolved without any sort of reset or delete of existing data.  Spending efforts to provide a troubleshooting that are not the best way, the recommended way,  to troubleshoot the issue, doesn’t make a ton of sense.