What's going on?

Hi

Thanks for reply

Ive never had network issues in the past and no other networked device has any problems.

Ive also had my Sonos devices for around two years with no issues, including when running Alexa. Suddenly, straight after integrating with assistant I seem to have a new issue every day. For that reason I'm betting the two are related.

Ive also a feeling, from what I've read, that plenty of other people are experiencing issues.

Also, with the above issue, I can quite happily play a radio station from the Sonos app but, try the exact same command with assistant, and the speaker is not available.

Bigskull,

Perhaps give a more detailed example of the exact issue. Which radio station, which speaker, what are they called?..What were your utterances?

Does the Sonos Speaker have the same/similar name as one of your Google Rooms, or perhaps there is another smart-home device with the same name.

Did you check to see if Google is hearing you correctly at https://myactivity.google.com/ ..??

There are quite a number of things it could be at this stage, but more details are needed to help you to find the answers here.

Hi

I have one stereo pair of ones called 'kitchen'. They behave as expected through the app and if I say the Google keyword one of the speakers responds as expected but, no matter what the command' the response is always 'it looks like the kitchen isn't available right now'. This was working fine this morning then suddenly it started doing this. Nothing in terms of networks, apps, etc has changed in this time.

To be honest I'm sure this will go away but yesterday it couldn't find my device and before that it couldn't find certain TuneIn stations and before that there was a large delay in responses to voice commands etc etc. I'm sure this will be fixed by unlinking and resetting everything as ive previously done but how many times should you have to do this?

This isn't something you want to spend time on. I may just go back to controlling via app and come back in a few months to see what it's like.

Hi

Tell a lie, this isn't every command. If I ask it to stop, play a radio station, skip a track, play a play list etc it will play message above. However if I ask it to adjust volume or a Google type question like weather, location info etc then it responds as expected. Strange.

Yes, the Sonos device/skill install, when working correctly, will allow initiation/playback 'implicitly' from your default Google music service and 'explicitly' from other services, like 'Amazon Music' for example, which is not currently available to Google Assistant, but is available through the Sonos App.

Similarly with Amazon Alexa, even if there is a problem with the authorising account token for the voice service, you will normally be able to voice-control the Sonos speaker 'queue’ playlist, with such instructions like ‘next/previous/pause/stop/mute' etc. but you won’t be able to initiate playback.

In your particular case it does sound like the 'authorising token' to share between Sonos and Google has been dropped for some reason and that you perhaps need to unlink/relink the Sonos device/skill again in your Google Home.

I have known this 'token-dropping’ issue to occur with Amazon Alexa too, albeit on rare occasions during the early updates and changes, or sometimes when a user changed their country settings etc. It usually only dropped for one or two users too and not everyone, for some inexplicable reason.

So my suggestion is to unlink/relink the Sonos device/skill again and just see how it goes.

After re-linking, don’t forget to then goto your Sonos Room for your Sonos One's and ensure the GA voice service is showing there too, or if not then add the voice service to the Sonos Room.

Hope you get it all sorted. It only takes a minute, or so, to sometimes do these things.

Hi Ken,

Thanks for reply again

To be honest I also thought that this would be the way to fix it but it hasn't. I've tried it several times with no success.

I give in.

Bigskull,

On removing the Sonos skill/device in the Google App, make sure all the speakers disappear from your Google Rooms and then check the Sonos App Room Settings to ensure the voice assistant has been removed from your Sonos Room... close your Apps fully. If using Android empty your App cache for Google Assistant. Then try the install again.

I've experienced the same thing when using commands on a speaker that is part of a group, but for me the answer seems to be to always say "in the kitchen" and so on. Google Assistant seems to work very differently from Alexa in this respect.

To a single speaker I can say play, resume, stop and so on without a room specification – no problem. But in a group those commands will only work in a small number of cases. In most cases Google Assistant will answer "Sure, playing ..." and then following with "It seems the kitchen isn't available right now".

On Alexa "play ... in the kitchen" breaks the kitchen out of the group, so I've always stayed clear of the room specification when using the command play, whereas on Google Assistant, "play ... in the kitchen" will still play to all speakers in the group.

I've experienced the same thing when using commands on a speaker that is part of a group, but for me the answer seems to be to always say "in the kitchen" and so on. Google Assistant seems to work very differently from Alexa in this respect.

To a single speaker I can say play, resume, stop and so on without a room specification – no problem. But in a group those commands will only work in a small number of cases. In most cases Google Assistant will answer "Sure, playing ..." and then following with "It seems the kitchen isn't available right now".

On Alexa "play ... in the kitchen" breaks the kitchen out of the group, so I've always stayed clear of the room specification when using the command play, whereas on Google Assistant, "play ... in the kitchen" will still play to all speakers in the group.
You can do away with the Sonos “Room Name” in the utterance to the Google Assistant when you subscribe to a supported MSP premium subscription service and have set that as your default music service in the GA/GH Apps and the same service is also installed in the Sonos App.

Some examples are: YouTube Music, Spotify, Deezer etc.

Hi

I was going to follow up on Ken's advice today but it turns out that voice commands are back working as normal again without me doing anything, strange.