for songs just make sure they are in your queue and have played through and it should work fine. I agree it’s an odd way for it to work.
I don’t know about radio stations unless you are talking pandora. The pandora radios I’ve recently used do show up as selectable.
I now have a Play 1 with the 5.1 firmware hooked up to SmartThings. I’m using it for voice window and door alerting (Front Door Open, Kitchen Side Window Open, etc.), voice arrival alerting (Tom is Arriving), and alarm state voice alerting during the 15 second delay until the siren goes bananas. I’d love to be able to use it for a washer and dryer alert and a couple other select things, but the sound integration hasn’t made it to those SmartApps quite yet.
I have to say, I’m pretty happy with it overall. There is a good 3-4 second delay most of the time that I’d like to see reduced, but it’s enough to let me know if something is open. The Play 1 is sitting in my Living Room facing the center of the house. With the announcements set to 65%, they can be heard pretty much anywhere a door isn’t closed. At 100%, they can be heard everywhere. The alarm announcement at 100% is intimidating with the lights flashing and the siren chirping every few seconds.
Music-wise, I hooked up my Pandora, Amazon, and Rhapsody accounts. They all integrate perfectly and sound surprisingly good through such a small speaker. Good, tight bass and hi fidelity definition in the mids and highs. Never breaks up, even at max volume.
I can see why Sonos is popular. This little thing is absolutely obnoxiously loud for it’s size and is a quality piece of gear. If the lag can be cut down and the capabilities improved (maybe play a sound, then an announcement, or both at the same time), then Sonos speakers could be the ultimate voice for the ST universe.
I agree with Raphael that this seems like a workaround instead of a real solution. And it’s really limiting.
If we have to have songs/sound files in the queue for them to work, that means you basically can’t use Sonos for anything else. Think about it.
I’ve recorded several messages to play when things happen (like, “Welcome home, Tim” and “Juno wants to come inside” and “There’s water under the sink in the guest bathroom”). So, I put those in my queue and let them play so they’ll be recognized. And, let’s presume they work just fine (I can’t actually get any songs/tracks/recorded messages to show up - but that’s a support issue for a different thread).
Then, I decide to have a dinner party. I look in my music library (which happens to come from iTunes, but could be from any source of course) and find a playlist I have called “Party Music.” Since I’m going to put that on random during the party, I sure don’t want “There’s water under the sink the guest bathroom” to suddenly play as a “song” during dinner. That means I’d naturally clear the queue before putting my playlist tracks into queue for the evening. And now? Well, it sounds to me as though the Sonos integration is totally hosed at that point.
And before going to bed, I’ll need to make sure I put all those sound files back into the queue (and it might require that I also play them all again) before Sonos will recognize them.
Have I got that right?
If so, I’m REALLY hoping there’s better integration being worked on right away. Because this just doesn’t work.
But I’m hoping someone will jump in here and tell me I’ve got this wrong and that I’m simply missing something. Anyone?
Tim,
I would suggest using the text to speak option for custom messages instead of a self recorded track. Just select custom and type in what you want it to say. I use that for all my XXX is arriving etc. I even have one I leave blank that I edit on the fly to show off the system. Those have nothing to do with the queue. However for the song issue I share your frustration.
I stopped using the Sonos mood music app, too unreliable and doesn’t allow you to choose multiple vs. single speakers.
I grabbed the Sonos HTTP API from a dev on GitHub. Works like a charm and you can create presets that includes the ability to set multiple or single speakers with each different preset. You call them through a URL so I just changed the mood music app to send commands to my home server instead of the Sonos directly. Fast, simple, clean solution that also allowed me to make my unused apple remote a controller for the Sonos using Remote Buddy! It now does text-to-speech as well, and once again, so much faster than going through SmartThings directly.
I’ve just gone through this myself, and as a solution I created a new SmartApp imported from the stock Sonos notify with sound. Then I added my custom cases and the relevant links to the mp3 file. The annoying thing is that it has to download it so there’s no local storage, however that’s a Sonos “feature” and not anything to do with SmartThings. Using this method would not pollute a playlist.
While that works fine, I’d much rather have pre-recorded “songs” which may not be music but sound effects or my voice, etc.
Here is a little post of my setup and solutions. http://www.duppeditten.com/blog/sonos-audio-in-every-room
Hey All,
We’re going to be working directly with Sonos to implement their next version of their APIs that will allow us to have more reliable controls. Their APIs won’t be readily available however.
@gilbert When you say the APIs won’t be readily available that means to the general SmartThings public? I’m fine with that as long as the SmartThings provided apps work as expected.
He means the Sonos API’s are not available to anyone yet. (not us) They are working on them.
Quick random question for everyone, has anyone found a way to make UBI’s replies be played though your Sonos yet? is this possible or a dream to far ? haha
cheers
kyle
Soo… Where is the development of the Sonos integration with smartthings at?
I do not see any options for groups, if you have been given the APIs from Sonos by now, are groups due in the not to distant future…
While I appreciate that the way Sonos groups and ungroups is potentially complicated, having groups for Sonos in smartthings is kind of essential to the point of Sonos. Apart from being fairly good quality music playing devices, the biggest selling point is the grouped and in sync playback. Not having its primary feature seems a huge oversight.