Stand by for a barrage of complaints from other members of the household who complain that the left-click behaviour mysteriously changes every now and then for no apparent reason and who end the tirade with the observation that Roon is a terrible piece of software…
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Good point, but storing defaults by profile might work. I’d like to see a lot more done with profiles, including a default library view that filters out my daughters recent additions.
I think what I am proposing, however, is perceived as breaking a fundamental Roon principle ie: that the UI should be the same, everywhere. The first thing I’d note is that since the phone app was released this is more of a guideline than a rule. The second is that the UI being the same is not inconsistent with some measure of customisation. You just have the same customisation possibilities everywhere.
How does one right-click when using a tablet?
Long press.
Thanks, I wonder how many other “easter eggs” I’ve no knowledge of are embedded in the UI.
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The multiple steps to simply play a new song is crazy…also I too spend a lot of my time “curating” my queue and it is quite silly that I need to be afraid when I am listening to music with the fear that the queue will all go away with one wrong move! Listening to music is supposed to be relaxing!
That’s interesting. You are afraid your queue will go away, but you think the multiple step play function is crazy.
Use your head please: the two step play function is exactly that thing that prevents your queue from accidently being killed,
I’m not saying it can’t be done, but why make it a multi-step process to accomplish a common task like adding a song to the queue? A non destructive queue would accomplish that. All I can say is I’ve not seen where the current Functionality is intuitive to anyone. Whenever friends come over and I give them control of the iPad, they always get frustrated with losing the songs in the queue, give up and hand me back e iPad. Often, I also get comments like my simple system at home works better. Roon will not gain wide spread acceptance if this is the case.
I think Roon would do well comparing the two methods using focus groups to see what users really want if they wanted to broaden Roon’s appeal. Just because Sooloos worked this way or tried this or that previously does not mean it applies here. Sooloos was way ahead of it’s time and perhaps users (after investing a lot of money in their system), “learned” to love it, but that does not mean it was perfect with no room for improvement. Plus, back then there was nothing else to compare to and now there is.
It would be interesting for Roon to offer the two options (destructive and not) and keep statistics on which users use more. The fact that no other software uses a destructive queue has to mean something.
It may be worthwhile linking to @mike’s musings here:
As for me – I really would want no change to the way things are working now (I loathe a stale queue, especially since Roon so expertly offers new starting points all the time), but I can see queuemongers are operating from an entirely different mindset when playing music.
Another prediction of doom and gloom from someone who obviously hasn’t taken the time to consider all the implications of what they are requesting
What I find ironic is that Sonos, who have been around since 2002…and the Roon guys who have been involved in “thru House” music replay since approx 2005…and have obviously during that time listened to THOUSANDS of their customers worldwide…have BOTH arrived at the same method adding Music to the Play Queue…i.e. a TWO STEP process to add Tracks to the queue
Given Sonos’ market dominance in the house music market, I seriously doubt your claim of not gaining “wide spread acceptance” either applies to Sonos or Roon on the basis of their both required Two clicks to add tracks to the queue
Just because you haven’t considered ALL of the Use Cases that are involved in Multi-Zone replay throughout a house, doesn’t make their approach wrong…and given their length of time in the market, they are more likely to be right
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I also have Sonos in my house (since the early 2000’s) and it works fine for me because it doesn’t have a destructive queue. The destructive queue is the issue! And don’t get me wrong, I don’t want Roon to fail, I’m a lifetime subscriber. I want Roon to thrive and IMHO, the destructive queue is a major stumbling block.
So you’re admitting then that the entire paragraph above is essentially incorrect??..because EVERYTHING you say above applies EQUALLY to using Sonos…both for you and your Guests
We can pick apart words and specific items, but a user’s experience is the whole. The root issue here, IMHO, the destructive queue. For what it’s worth, I’ve not had anyone complain about Sonos, but they complain about Roon when they at are at my house. Why is that? We can correct the issue (or provide users the option to chose - destructive or non) or we can debate here and deny there is an issue.
Also, while Sonos is good, and I am happy with it, other UI’s like ipeng (for squeeze box) is even more intuitive.
Sorry, but you are changing your story to suit your narrative…and suggesting that people have a problem with Roon, when they don’t have a problem with Sonos
If one has a Guest at your house…and you give them an iPad to add Track(s) to a Queue…then the Options in the Sonos app are EXACTLY the same as in the Roon app
i.e. “Play Next” or “Add to Queue”
I’d be almost certain that your Guests are not aware of the “Destructive” Queue in Roon versus the Queue in Sonos…so it’s difficult to see how your Guests would be displeased with this aspect of Roon
By all means, if your Guests don’t like other aspects of Roon, then that’s fine…but the method of adding Tracks to the Queue in the same in Roon as Sonos…and yet you claim that they are happy with Sonos, but not with Roon…a claim that is difficult to understand or accept it has to be said
Then make it function like Sonos (queue and all) and everyone is happy?
The whole point is that it ALREADY functions like Sonos
So you want to keep the UI as it is because of a Guest? To me, this is ridiculous. Roon is for me and not for my Guest.
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I think you need to read my posts again, within the CONTEXT of their being replies to previous posters…so please don’t quote my post above out of context
And Yes, to me, Roon’s [and Sonos’] approach of requiring Two Clicks to Add Tracks to Play Queue is the best of the options currently available…driven by the fact that Roon needs to work CONSISTENTLY for ALL Users in a house…and across the various Computers, Tablets and Phones that are used to control Roon
I believe that it’s only after considering ALL the Use Cases…and the above two important points…that one can see the pragmatic sense in Roon’s approach to Queue Management
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Let me propose a very simple solution for power users who want to go directly to playing an album without the overlay.
Modifier key.
For example, on Mac, option-click to bypass the overlay. Or command-click. Shift-click. Whatever the user wants.
At the very least, please position the play button on the same exact spot so I don’t have to chase down the overlay play button.
Thank you! Winning solution delivered!
I like the idea of a way to play music immediately with one click. I like the idea of two clicks to specify exactly how the music should be played. What I can’t stand is having to click three times to play music under any circumstances.
JRiver has the right idea in my opinion by allowing the user to configure the response to certain UI actions. In that app, I’ve set double-clicking = Add to Queue and Play Now, which is what I want my default action to be. For anything else, I right-click and have access to all other options - which amounts to two clicks. But never three.