Question

A huge step backward--what are you guys thinking?


Userlevel 3
Badge +8
Is the new community your idea of an improvement? It is anything but an improvement. Several important threads I started have lost content. When I try and type a response, I can't see the entire response I am creating--it only allows me to see a couple of lines at a time.

I am a long-time Sonos user, and I feel that I have been slapped in the face. Sonos no longer has my endorsement.

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280 replies

Did you guys look at Discourse (http://www.discourse.org) at all? I've been using it over at BoingBoing and it feels like a better platform.

I kicked the tires on one of discourse.org cited customer sites (https://forums.docker.com/) and the forum seemed rather friendly. It was a decent blend of current "best practices" use of white space and utility.
There is some sort of glitch in the edit process. I wanted to make a change in the above, immediately after submitting. Unfortunately, clicking on the edit link accomplished nothing. I then attempted to add another reply (this reply), but I could not submit anything. Finally, I used the breadcrumb link back to New community feedback, located the above post, and was able to edit. I don't know if this is in the mix, but I was ordering the Comments list by Newest first.
Did you guys look at Discourse (http://www.discourse.org) at all? I've been using it over at BoingBoing and it feels like a better platform.

I kicked the tires on one of discourse.org cited customer sites (https://forums.docker.com/) and the forum seemed rather friendly. It was a decent blend of current "best practices" use of white space and utility.

Good feel to the place. Some notables on the customer list.

It's threaded, not flat, but there seem to be a lot of filtering options to make it acceptable. I've opened an account and started a play in the sandbox. Nice WYSIWYG editor.
[quote=amun] there's no reason why we couldn't set up another user-driven site if we want to.
We'd lose the history, of course, but as long as enough of the 'old guard' were on board, it could work well.


That's an intriguing line of thinking. The Sonos user universe would not be the losers as long as they had an easy way to locate this from outside the Sonos site, and that is important because the idea is to give better service to all, not just those that were forum users. But short term, there would be an adverse effect if forum expertise does a mass exit.

The only people that would be really unhappy with this are Sonos managers that want to be masters of the universe.

The challenge is the housekeeping and keeping away the spammers.
short term, there would be an adverse effect if forum expertise does a mass exit.
The sense I'm getting is that a number have already headed for the door. The question then is how to best recapture their interest.
Did you guys look at Discourse (http://www.discourse.org) at all? I've been using it over at BoingBoing and it feels like a better platform.

Just had a /very/ quick look - still seems to have a lot of the kiddy facilities that put me off. Looks better than this, though.

The old forums system may have looked old fashioned, but it worked incredibly well... i.e. function over form
The challenge is the housekeeping and keeping away the spammers.

There would be a number of challenges - we'd be starting from scratch, after all...

However, it's all do-able, with sufficient will and support.
Yes BlueChrystalMan, I had one going to the error page, did a refresh/reload and presto, off I went to the actual thread. Good "trick"!
Too many workarounds to make this place usable. And still no text in the body of the message. Come on guys... enable the option... its a two second fix. If it doesn't have the option, then the sales rep for this software took you for a ride.
Is there any benefit from this platform compared to the one forum was on? Not counting the avatar/likes and other bells and whistles. There has got to be at least one substantive way how this platform serves the target user better than the old one - which is that? It can't be all negative surely - more than one would be nice of course.
Userlevel 7
Badge +17
Is there any benefit from this platform compared to the one forum was on? Not counting the avatar/likes and other bells and whistles. There has got to be at least one substantive way how this platform serves the target user better than the old one - which is that? It can't be all negative surely - more than one would be nice of course.

I struggle to see any. Apart from the fluffy stuff about profiles etc but Id trade that for decent functionality that is used regularly !

I also wonder about the whole Question and Answer thing. Based on this explanation https://en.community.sonos.com/ask-a-question-228987/how-the-ask-a-question-forum-works-6730730 you would expect very few unanswered questions but I see some going back 2 years ! Can Sonos sent on 'Answered' or only the author ? Why havent all the answered questions already been moved to other sections ?

I struggle to see any. Apart from the fluffy stuff about profiles etc but Id trade that for decent functionality that is used regularly !

I don't count the fluff. Let's see if someone can point to some functional advantages that have come about.
A huge functional DISadvantage is this that comes up every time I click the link in an email to get to the topic. And it doesn't just affect me.


Something has gone wrong

Sorry, the page you are looking for might have been removed, is temporarily unavailable, or the name has been changed.

If you came here through our website, please let us know where this error occurred, so we can repair the defect. Contact us by e-mail: community@sonos.com.

If you came here through a link on another website, this reference will have been incorrectly recorded. Unfortunately we cannot change this. Please contact the website which recorded this error directly.

Perhaps the following can be of help:

Check that the spelling in the address bar is correct.
Go to: Homepage.
Click the on 'previous' button in your browser if you want to try another link.
I don't get this ever on my android phone. And I just checked - not on my mac/safari either. It does not appear to be a general problem.
I do, just got the error again. That's using Firefox on a Mac. Did a reload and then it goes to the right page.
Did you guys look at Discourse (http://www.discourse.org) at all? I've been using it over at BoingBoing and it feels like a better platform.

Just had a /very/ quick look - still seems to have a lot of the kiddy facilities that put me off. Looks better than this, though.

If you mean badges etc it looks like they can be customised, as can much of its behaviour:
Encourage positive community behaviors through the included set of badges, or add your own custom badges.
I'm using the mobile version at the moment and cannot quote. Hermie, I saw this message once on day one. You may have a stale entry in a cache somewhere, but I can't explain why you have this issue in multiple browsers. I usually use Firefox on a desktop and I keep Firefox locked down as far as cookies, pop-ups, and tracking are concerned. Sometimes this lock down causes troubles, but I haven't noticed any while using this community.
Hermie,

I just had a wild thought. Perhaps your router caches DNS entries and there is a stale entry.
It is hit or miss, buzz. Mostly miss. I've cleared all that and even used it on a WIFI system away from my home system and it still happens. The redirect that the link in the email is supposed to trigger doesn't work most of the time. It is a software problem... not a browser problem.
FWIW, posting replies using my S4 is not much fun. After a Submit I can't use the page until I refresh.
I found one functional benefit - one can post a problem here with a diagnostic number and get Sonos to look at it for troubleshooting actions.
I found one functional benefit - one can post a problem here with a diagnostic number and get Sonos to look at it for troubleshooting actions.
As one has always been able to do via the Send an email link off the main support page.
Userlevel 6
Badge +8
With the old forums, I would usually stop by once a day, not because I needed help, but because I just enjoyed reading many of the conversations. These new forms are not enjoyable. I am now another who will probably only visit the forums when I need help on a specific issue.
Userlevel 5
Badge +5
The other thing I dislike here is that you have to scroll down to the bottom of the page before you can page forward. Also no ability to go to a specific post number or page. User interface is very poor.
Looks like you can go to a specific page in a thread by machoing the URL. Right now I'm on page 5. This is the URL: https://en.community.sonos.com/new-community-feedback-229090/a-huge-step-backward-what-are-you-guys-thinking-6730677/index5.html

If I want to go to page 4, I can change it to this: https://en.community.sonos.com/new-community-feedback-229090/a-huge-step-backward-what-are-you-guys-thinking-6730677/index4.html

But that's only in a thread.

There doesn't seem to be a way to do this from an index page.