Sonos Staff

The Request Line: how it works and how to get the most out of it

38 replies
506 views

The Request Line is where you tell us what you'd like Sonos to build, change, or bring back. It's been launched today and I realized it would be helpful to have one post that explained the whole thing: how to submit, what happens after you do, and what the statuses actually mean. So here it is. We'll keep adding to this as the process settles in.

NOTE: You must have an account on the Community Forums to access (and submit an idea) on the Request Line.

What belongs on the Request Line

Feature requests and product ideas for anything Sonos. The app, speakers and home theater, headphones, services, and the Community itself.

Two things are better off elsewhere:

Something isn't working the way it should. That's a support question. Post it in the relevant help category so the community and our support team can dig in with you.
General thoughts or opinions without a specific ask. General Feedback or Owners Cafe is the right home for those.

How to write a request that gets noticed

Give it a clear, specific title. "Add a sleep timer to the Now Playing screen" is easier to act on than "Sleep timer please."
Describe the problem before the solution. What are you trying to do, which products are involved, and how often does it come up? That context is what the product teams actually read.
Search first. If someone already asked, vote and comment there instead. One request with 200 votes carries far more weight than twenty near-duplicates with ten each.
One request per post. Bundled asks are hard to track and harder to update.
Pick the right product area. Not sure? Post it anyway and the moderation team will re-tag it.

Votes and comments do different jobs

Votes tell us how many of you want something. Comments tell us why. When you comment, share your own setup and what you're running into. "I have an Arc with Era 300 surrounds and hit this every time I switch inputs" says a lot more than a plus one.

What happens after you submit

Every request moves through a set of statuses so you can see where it stands:

[New Idea] → [Open] → [In Development] → [Implemented]

Some requests will also land on:

[Parked]: Not being worked on right now, but not off the table either. We'll say why where we can, and these get another look as planning cycles come around.
[Closed]: This one won't be worked on in the foreseeable future. We'll leave a reason, and the request stays visible so the conversation and the votes aren't lost. If things change down the road, you're welcome to raise it again.

How requests get prioritized

Votes matter, and they aren't the only thing that matters. What I keep hearing from the product teams is that they weigh a few things together:

How many people a change affects, and how much
How it fits with what's already in motion
How complex it is to build and test across the full range of Sonos products and setups

So a heavily voted request can take a while if it's a big lift, and a smaller one can move quickly if it unlocks something else. Either way, every request adds to the picture.

Keeping you in the loop

We're working on a regular roundup of what moved, what's planned, and what's still being looked at. Think of it as our way of closing the loop instead of letting requests sit quietly. This will likely land during our regular monthly Office Hours held right here on the Community Forums.

A few expected questions

Why was my request marked Closed?
Usually because it's out of scope for the product, isn't feasible with how the system works today, or won't be revisited in the near term. We'll always try to leave a reason.

What's the difference between Parked and Closed?
Parked means it's paused and will come back around during planning. Not planned means it won't be considered for the foreseeable future.

Does voting make a difference?
Yes. It isn't a straight ranking, but votes and comments are the clearest signal of demand the product teams get from the community, and they're read.

Will I be notified when the status changes?
If you posted, voted, commented, or followed a request, you'll get a notification when it moves.

I posted a bug here by mistake. What now?
No problem. Reply or tag a moderator and we'll move it to the right help category.

Can I request something involving a third-party service or integration?
Yes. Just keep in mind partner integrations depend on both sides, so those can take longer and sometimes aren't entirely in our hands.

My request was closed. Can I resubmit it?
You can. If the situation has changed since it was closed, say so in the new post and it'll get a fresh look.

If there's anything missing here that would make the Request Line easier to use, let us know below.

R

RavingDave

Enthusiast II

Sounds like a great idea to have a single location where requests can be lodged, and progress tracked.

What I’m not clear on is whether this thread is the actual ‘Request Line’ itself where new requests should be posted, or is there another separate ‘request line’ log somewhere (which I’ve not found yet) where requests are to be lodged and tracked?

Stanley_4

Grand Maestro

A bit hidden but it is here

R

RavingDave

Enthusiast II

I can’t find any way of navigating to ‘start a new topic’ when viewing the Community page on my iPhone (Safari).

When logged into a Windows web browser the Sonos Community header bar has a direct link to ‘Request Line’, and also a large blue button on the top right of the header to ‘Create Topic’. However I’ve been unable to find either of these on my mobile browser?

C

craigski

Local Superstar

Search first. If someone already asked, vote and comment there instead. One request with 200 votes carries far more weight than twenty near-duplicates with ten each.

This made me smile, as there is some irony. Can I request that the forum search is improved/fixed, to be useful and find previous requests in the request line. 😀

Here is an example of search for ‘feature requests’, ‘No Document Match’ and also unable to filter ‘Ideas’:

Also, will the previous historical posts marked as ‘feature request’ by the mods be added to the ‘request line’ with links to the existing posts to avoid duplicates using the old system?

Keith NAuthor

Sonos Staff

Search is a thing I’ve been talking with Gainsight about since coming back to Community. I know it’s a pain point and I expect the topic to come up here. That said, I don’t want the Request Line turning into a “this is how search is broke” party. Let’s keep it actionable and specific. The better formatted the idea (especially when it comes to Platform requests) the easier it will be for me to make the case.

Going through the entire backlog of Feature Requests in the Community Forums and then determining where they fall within the various statuses, is quite the undertaking. I don’t expect our moderation team to do that. They have historically reported feature requests to myself and stakeholders at Sonos, so I’m taking in good faith that we have made our case in the past. Moving forward, we have “receipts”, proper structure and tbh - accountability.

Building community is like building a garden. You build the frame, till the ground, plant the seeds, feed the plants & sometimes you gotta pull the weeds.

C

craigski

Local Superstar

Search is broke. I highlighted you can not filter search ‘Idea’, you can only search ‘Conversation’ and ‘Question’.

Would you like me to create an ‘idea’ to able to search on ideas, rather than point out a defect?

U

UCFKnight

Contributor I

If we want to browse all the ideas being requested by other members so we can upvote those that we like - is there a way to browse all Request Line posts?

U

UCFKnight

Contributor I

I may have just answered my own question. I see clicking the “Request Line” tag at the bottom of this post brings up all other posts with that tag. However, not seeing another way to get to that set of results.

kdowling

In the top banner, click “Request Line”.

C

craigski

Local Superstar

https://en.community.sonos.com/ideas

Then sort by ‘Most Votes’ to see the most popular ‘ideas’ in the ‘request line’.

Unfortunately, the ideas url is currently excluded from Google indexing, and therefore searching, so you have to login to community to review.

A

adrienblake530

Lyricist I

Really clear guide, thanks. One small thing that confused me: the status list mentions Parked and Closed, but the FAQ talks about requests being marked “Not planned”, and the Parked vs Closed answer switches to “Not planned” too. Is that the same as Closed, or a separate status? Might be worth matching the wording so people aren’t unsure where their request stands.

A

adrienblake530

Lyricist I

Helpful overview, thanks. Quick question: the FAQ mentions “Not planned”, but that status isn’t in the list above. Is it the same as Closed?

Keith NAuthor

Sonos Staff

Yes went back and forth with that and made a last minute decision to just lump it in with Closed to keep it concise.

Building community is like building a garden. You build the frame, till the ground, plant the seeds, feed the plants & sometimes you gotta pull the weeds.

MoPac

Headliner III

Now that there is a Beam with up-firing drivers it would be nice to have ERA 100 size speakers also with up-firing speakers. My Beam soundbars are both in bedrooms where using a suround speaker the size of the ERA 300 makes no sense.

Stanley_4

Grand Maestro

That would be nice for surround use.

Maybe also allow them to be Atmos capable, at least as a non-soundbar pair. Give Play 1, 3 and One folks a good reason to upgrade.

MoPac

Headliner III

I believe the ERA 100 is Atmos compatible. Just missing up-firing speakers.

C

craigski

Local Superstar

Is the Ideas system getting traction with Sonos Users?

50% of ideas have no votes (apart from creator) and only 2 have more than 10 votes.

The top idea (Hi-Res eye candy logo for local library) with 11 Up votes, has 132 views. If this is 132 views from unique users, is this 121 are abstaining from voting as they don’t think its a useful idea for their own Sonos systems? Or are the views repeat views from the creator checking how many Up votes have been achieved, ie there have not been 132 unique views of the Idea?

jgatie

No offense to the folks who came up with the idea, but the “Submit an Idea for Votes” type forum has been attempted more than once, and it turned into a dumpster fire every time. Nothing but one-and-done voters with an agenda and a couple of die hard supporters with time on their hands who post and post and post, and then scream that their needs aren’t being met, when the truth is 1000’s of posts by 2 people is not the same as 10 posts by 1000 people. And even if a definitive answer is given that an idea isn’t coming to fruition and why, the die-hard posters double down, and try explaining why they, a layman, know better than the Engineers who actually do this stuff for a living. I’d rather not participate again.

Plus, it appears to me that the indiscernible nature of reddit style threaded replies has caused posts to go down across all the forums. Just a casual observation; I have no data on this (and I am admittedly biased).

Smilja

It would be a different story if nested replies automatically expanded when clicking the parent post.

»And the world is like an apple whirling silently in space, Like the circles that you find in the windmills of your mind.« (›Windmills Of Your Mind‹ [1967]. Music by Michel Legrand ; English lyrics written by Alan & Marilyn Bergman)

Stanley_4

Grand Maestro

Just now, here:

Got 404'd, New Post link: https://en.community.sonos.com/owners-cafe-228997/the-request-line-how-it-works-and-how-to-get-the-most-out-of-it-6934977/index2.html#post16899956

The actual post, Last Post link: https://en.community.sonos.com/owners-cafe-228997/the-request-line-how-it-works-and-how-to-get-the-most-out-of-it-6934977?postid=16899956#post16899956

I'm not giving up but my time is limited so wasting it hunting takes away from helpful responses.

Airgetlam

This probably isn’t the right thread for this, but I’m finding more and more of the ‘x new’ links are leading to 404 pages, or just the first post, not the ‘new’ posts. And god forbid if one is a reply up the chain, and the other is a new post to the thread.

Bruce

Airgetlam

Huh. Just got another one. To be clear, the page presented by Gainsight does not say 404, just that the page isn’t found. I’m taking the assumption it is a 404 of some type (are there more than one type of 404s?)

Bruce

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