With this latest build (259 I believe) you have changed the fundamental behavior of your UI. This is annoying. What if I changed the way your car operated overnight? Perhaps I sneak into your garage, and switch the gas peddle with the brake . What happens the next time you operate your vehicle?
It does not matter if the majority wanted it, that it is “better”, or you have placed a small selection button (with the old functionality of of play, add to Que, add next, etc.) it is too much of a fundamental UI change to not annoy.
Why did you not give a usable selectable check box for those who wanted one click play in settings and leave the UI as is? IMO, you have violated a basic axiom of UI design - once you create your own unique ecosystem don’t change it fundamentally and in large increments. What’s next, a “Metro” Roon??
I normally try to wait and see before updateing to the latest build and by what I am reading I am glad I did.
I have also been downloading each build for a while now in case I have to rebuild my PC.
Roon Labs should list the previous builds as so folks can roll back to a previous version for any reason. The way it is setup, updateing from within the app is convenient to update but there is no way to roll back and older versions for download are unavailable.
If only it was that easy… The problem is that the database changes from one version to the next are not compatible. You cant always run a new DB with old Roon. It works if we made no change, but if we did, you will go corrupt or not even come up.
Then the only way back would be to start completely over from scratch. There are different scenarios to warrant going back to different build. One would be this UI issue, another would be hardware compatibility issue.
If we have a version of Roon that is working perfectly fine with no issues what so ever and an update is applied and this update does not agree with my hardware for whatever reason, then what would my recourse be? Also with regard to UI changes such as the one applied with this last build?
I would also assume that this is why we have the ability to turn off automatic updates. I hate automatic updates for this reason.
I would think that a database change that you are referring to should only apply to a major update ie going from Version 1.0 to Version 2.0. But going for example from a .1 version to a .2 version then this should not apply because this should be considered a minor update.
With all due respects @Mike_Dubois, Danny may well just know more about what Roon actually does rather than your assessment of what it should do. Many recent upgrades necessitated database updates AFAIK from the “we are updating your database - this may take some time message”.
You are absolutely correct about Danny and that is why I was inquiring about this. Who else better to ask. I have been involved with database updates for a very long time and .version updates are very minor and I believe that Danny knows exactly what I am referring to. When you go from a Version number to the next number like I pointed out, then this is considered a major update but when you go from .number to the next .number then this is considered minor.
Mike,
That’s a truism, but it has nothing to do with whether the database is changed or not. Minor updates often involved minor updates to the database to support them. I don’t think it’s wise to compare Roon development with the development of other applications / databases … different horses different courses.
(Not that it matters but my background is in enterprise level logistics applications / databases but that’s a whole different world … all our clients have QA machines where any change is tested before it is applied to their production systems).
Provided one has a back of the Roon database that was take before the update was applied, then there is always a regression step that can be taken should the new version not work out at that time.
Back on topic,
I too am frustrated that the new one click play feature, aka the queue destroying grenade that can not be defused.
For me and it seems others as well … it’s just way, way, too easy for someone to inadvertently wipe the queue out. I appreciate that for some possibly many Roon users this is not an issue for them, I guess they don’t tend to build play queues and that’s fine. However, allowing those that do who that are concerned should be allowed to disable or possibly re-configure it to be a ‘One click’ - ‘Add To Queue’ action, (in fact the later would be perfectly for me).
I agree that the ‘play now’ click shouldn’t delete the queue. But saying we need to revert one click play is rather like throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
One click play is MUCH better - why would anyone want multiple clicks to achieve something so simple.
But perhaps ‘Play Now’ could be changed so that it no longer clears the queue.
Because it is not that simple. Excepting perhaps when I first sit down and fire up the Roon software, I am almost never pointing and shooting (i.e. playing one track at a time). 9 out of 10 times I am adding, subtracting, or otherwise manipulating a queue/playlist.
Why would I want an auto destruct button mislabeled as a a “play” button?
If all you are doing is pointing and shooting, why would you purchase and expensive, feature rich software like Roon? Why not just use much less expensive software (most of it is “free” and comes with your OS/device)?
It’s clear that you and I use Roon in completely different ways. I am almost never “adding, subtracting, or otherwise manipulating a queue/playlist” - I select an album and I click “Play Now”. On the odd occasion that I want to add an additional album or two to the queue, I have quickly learned to click the drop-down and choose the “Add to queue” option.
I understand that “Play Now” does what it says on the tin - it plays it now, and will blow the queue to smithereens. I accept that; I don’t think it’s mislabelled. It just doesn’t do what you want it to do, which is (I assume) add next to queue. If this were to be an option in Settings, would it help?
Geoff_Coupe, I agree we don’t use it the same way. This begs the question for me as to why would you use a complex, $expensive$, feature rich player like Roon when Windows Media Player does exactly what you want it to do (and does it quite well)?
Am I some weird “audiophile” who demands a certain sophistication out of his software to match his sophisticated tastes and musical habits. Well, yes! That is why I am willing to pay for Roon which is at least an order of magnitude more expensive than just about any other option. If it is now turning a corner and trying to be like every other player out there - with simplistic “one click” controls designed to satisfy the point-and-shoot, one track/album generation then that is a rejection of “sophisticated” users such as myself and the $value$ of Roon drops commensurably…
Simple - WMP has no notion of multiple zones. It can, at a push, utilise DLNA (via “Play To”), which sucks - and which Microsoft has dropped in the successor to WMP: Groove. WMP also has no concept of Compositions (Groove doesn’t even know about Composers, fer gawd’s sake).
The rich metadata of Roon is also a nice thick layer of icing on the cake. Go back to WMP or Groove? You have to be joking!
That would help me quite a bit. I can deal with the current behavior as it stands, but it’s led me to realize that the thing I most often want to do with the “main button” is “add to queue.”
Also, I may be alone in this, and it may have some sinister implications I haven’t worked out, but for me, the ideal default behavior for the “main button” would be “add to queue, and if there’s nothing already in the queue, just start playing.”
“You have to be joking!” Well, I sort of am. I have the same “you guys are joking, right?!?” reaction to the insistence that a simplistic play button design/behavior (which is what just about all other players implement and are good at it - better at it than Roon is with this latest update fer sur) is what should be implemented in Roon.
Come on Roon, how about a little acceptance that this was a mistake and at least give us “audiophiles” what we pay for?
Geoff_Coupe, I will consult the Elders as to your current status…it’s not looking good for you however
Here is our fundamental disagreement - the direction is very very wrong and smells like an attempt to satisfy a kind of mass market, Best Buy mentality that complains of more than one click and anything that is not “simple” to the point of simplistic. This mentality is not all bad, but I am use to paying much much less for it. Actually, it comes “free” with my OS…
I guess that’s really hard for you to understand all the many different ways others use Roon, but please don’t try to make yourself appear superior with a self-awarded “audiophile” label. There are many good reasons to use Roon for high quality music listening that have nothing to do with queues or playlists. Heck, some of us use Roon as if were an old-fashioned record player, one record at a time.
Strange this. I’ve waited for Roon to add a few features, convolution being the most important. When the DSP function was introduced it contained much more than that and I was very pleased. Yes I am a weird and ‘sophisticated’ ‘audiophile’, but I wanted one-click-play. In general I want the player part of Roon to be a player as I mainly play albums. I agree with Geoff_Coupe here. On the other hand it is not a good thing that the new feature becomes a problem for part of the userbase. A setting that controls the play behaviour would be better I think. At the same time I’d like to see settings to hide ratings, and other ‘popularity’ stuff. Play counts for example. Windows Media Player is not available for Linux is it? What about RAAT or convolution?
