[1.0.0.70/82][0.7.9]Inaudible volume levels after notification triggers audio ducking

[RRL]

Since the latest update on the Spotify app the music will no longer get interrupted by notifications. This functionality is far from useful when using other apps simultaneously.

Often I use Spotify in the car in combination with my GPS and an app which warns me (legally) for speed traps. Before the update Spotify briefly paused for a GPS instruction or an alarm for a speed trap, which made them clearly noticable.

The apps in this case are Sygic and FlitsNav (Dutch). They use respectively the media volume and alarm volume, both are giving problems.
- The media volume is briefly lowered when Sygic has an instruction. Because Sygic uses this volume too, the instruction volume is lowered as well. This makes that the instructions are pronounced on a lower volume than normally and let the music kick in hard again after the barely audible instructions.
- FlitsNav uses the alarm volume, the same as used for the alarm clock. Even though the warnings are noticable, they are far less clear than they used to be. This makes that this app becomes far less affective compared to a total interruption of the music.

Is there a possibility to have the music interrupted for notifications again?

Phone: Samsung Galaxy SIII Mini
Android version: 4.1.2 (latest)
Spotify version: Latest update (automatically installed on April 10, 2014)
Sygic version: 13.4.2
FlitsNav version: 3.0.4

EDIT: I amended the subject/title to distinguish theis thread from http://community.spotify.com/t5/Help-Android/Music-interrupted-by-notification-ring/m-p/235200#U2352...

EDIT: Temporary solution here: http://community.spotify.com/t5/Help-Android/1-0-0-70-0-7-9-Inaudible-volume-levels-after-notificati...

[user-removed]

Oh dear. Can someone please edit the titile again to

Re: [1.0.0.82][1.0.0.70][0.7.9] Inaudible volume levels after notification triggers audio ducking

It's now 19 pages, 4 weeks, and 3 releases with this broken 😞

[SentineL_VDX]

Same here... I'm on version 1.0.0.82 (Android) with the new UI, and all those irrelevant things.... but issue is still present.

At my work, when we perform an update and doesn't go a expected, we always have a fast backout prepared to let the user continue working as it's expected without issues, if for some reason a bug was not found during QA Test. That way we can continue fixing any problem until we schedule a new date to perform again the update this time without those minor bugs.

That's called value added, where user has transparency and it's not affected (clearly something Spotify does not have).

Having 3 updates, where this issue has not been fixed it's like laughing at us... with no ETA, no workaround and working on irrelevant stuff on the app like the GUI.

PS: Please add version 1.0.0.82 too to the title.

[Peter__]

Done. 😉

[lachie_h]

@webvictim actually, yes it is. The more users complain about something, the more likely it is to be made a priority. There's plenty of people in this thread who know enough about android development (myself included) to know what the problem is and how to fix it. One even going as far to decompile the apk to literally prove that the problem is as he suggested.

Seems to me that you are the only one is this thread who needs to shut up.

It's pathetic.

[Peter__]

Just a quick note about 1.0.0.82, I suspect it is actually identical to 1.0.0.70 rather than being a new update, hence why I merged them in the title. .70 was only available to a small % of user's via Google Play (most people are still on 0.7.9 until today) and it appears .82 is the public release which has just gone out to everyone.

I don't actually know, just speculating. (And it definitely hasn't fixed this bug...)

[FalconFour]

The fact that there can be a whole new user interface and still exist a bug that was introduced in the last version of the old UI proves in the most tragic way that beauty is only skin deep - literally, as in the new skin with the same ugly guts.

Still broken between Spotify and Google Maps. I also just got the update and got an abusive "welcome to Costco, I love you" style notification when I opened it. Cute, but inappropriate. Ah well, still love me some Google Play Music. I just miss the popular songs charts for artists, and the curated playlists... 😕

[user-removed]

The new UI has probably been long in development. What's odd is that a bug fix can't be introduced in 4 weeks as a parallel activity.

I guess it's just the same priority as many other low priority bugs - maybe few outside of this forum are compaining. So Spotify's view is only a few dozen users are considering this critical. It may be many more are affected, but they're simply not complaining. We DO know, after all, that Spotify don't exactly have a good record for listening to their paying customers and actioning anything related to what they want - at least not  from here - so why should this bug issue be any different!? 

But you'd think this was such a common use case that Spotify's own staff would be moaning (internally) too and something would be done. Go figure...

For what it's worth, a friend with a Samsung S5 tells me it works fine for him... :-S

The only real recourse is to vote with your wallet as I (and some others) have already done. And if/when Spotify go out of business at some point in the future, we'll all be saying "Well, they never listened to their customers, for years" regardless of if that's the cause 😉

[sprky09]

extremely fusterating issue. I am dependent on GPS notifications while driving. Please elevate to higher priority. Will have to cancel subscription if issue not solved.

thank you. 

[Mr_Bone]

I too am experiencing this problem using google maps with Spotify - When spotify is interupted the voice on google maps is way too low, can't hear it. Extrememly annoying bug! Have read a lot of this thread, but can someone clarify if Spotify are on the case to fix this or not? Am using Spotify on an HTC one mini

[johannesdr]

Just wanted to confirm that I am having the same problem on my Nexus 5 (Android 4.4.2). I use Spotify when I go running in combination with Runkeeper. It is no longer possible to understand the audio cues.

Has anyone from Spotify support given any feedback or confirmed this issue? Or is there no way to know if they are working on a fix?

[jthutcheson]

@Mr_Bone, @johannesdr:

Yes, back on page 15 Richard (community moderator) dropped in to let us know that Spotify's developers are aware of the issue, and are working on a fix to the root of the issue.  They will be pushing an update for it as soon as they can.

[Gertv]

A spotify administrator has posted here stating that they are aware of the problem and they are looking into it.

If they actually are... nobody knows.

[jthutcheson]

As far as the continued waiting is concerned, here's my view:

The ducking function/call is 100% properly implemented.  Otherwise, STREAM_NOTIFICATION wouldn't cause Spotify to duck properly, but it does (these are your email/message/whatever notification tones).  Spotify must have an issue where they are attempting to reduce their own custom-built AudioTrack volume (it is highly unlikely that they are using the MediaPlayer class for their stream), and it is affecting the volume of STREAM_MUSIC as well.  Since STREAM_MUSIC is where audio from things like games and navigation apps is directed to, per the Android developer guidelines, the volume of the navigation read-out is affected as well.

To make things that much more difficult, there aren't any errors to assist in chasing down the problem.  The system does precisely what it is coded to do with no exceptions or errors.  However, the end result is not the intended behavior.  That makes it an order of magnitude more difficult to solve.  Not only that, but if it has to do with the way that they have volume control implemented in AudioTrack, if they try to fix it they have the possibility of breaking playback volume control entirely, which I think everyone can agree would be worse.

As for rolling back, that may not have been an option, as the old code may have had other bugs that were fixed at the same time, or just plain break the app entirely.  Again, the lesser of two evils is to keep an app that works in 75% of use-cases, rather than something that doesn't work at all.

TL;DR:  I think they are having to deal with something coded in a way somebody thought was clever two years ago, but is casuing the issue we are seeing today.  I am 100% certain that if it was just a bug in the ducking code, it would have been fixed by now.  Sometimes simple questions have very very complex answers.

[SentineL_VDX]

Thanks for your point of view and explanation. I´ve found some sense on that.

But I must say as costumer I don't care about their problems cause they are charging me for a product I expect to coexist with the rest of the Apps. and notifications on my phone. I won't complain if I have same service for free.

There's some people like my wife who loves it cause their prefer music over everything else, in fact she was hating all those notifications stopping her music.

But in my case that I drive all the time to work, and have to be available receiving calls, checking on my GPS because I don't know every single route in my country, it's a big mess... 

Nowadays since the "buggy" update (to call it in some way), I cannot use spotify on my car or when not looking my phone screen, because my work is first. I need to hear my calls, my GPS voice guide, etc.

[user-removed]

https://twitter.com/SpotifyCares/status/463676831938666496

Hi Francis, we're working on a fix for this. We'll post updates on the thread as soon as we have them /G

[jthutcheson]

Oh, I'm absolutely not saying complaints are invalid or anything of the sort.  And, as a fellow premium subscriber, I want this fixed asap.  I may decide to cancel my subscription as well, and will be sure to note that in the cancellation in a reasonable manner, but it isn't worth getting myself bent out of shape over.

I was mainly pointing out that there are some in this thread who are implying that because Spotify hasn't pushed a fix in the last few weeks, that they are (singularly or as a whole) incompetent, useless, uncaring, sadistic, or any combination thereof.  The more likely case is that the issue is not as simple as the developer who posted a "fix" led them to believe.  Had that post not been made, it is quite possible that the narrative would be at least a little different; more "I really want this fixed" than "You've been given the code now copy/paste and push it out!"

Ironically, the same people yelling for a "quick fix" are the ones complaining about a lack of adequate testing, but I digress.

Not caring if the problem is a misplaced semicolon or an incorrectly implemented method is understandable; we simply want our purchase to work as advertised, and we pay Spotify to do all the fiddly-widdly, softy-wofty stuff.  But saying (or implying sarcastically) that they don't care when we are explicitly told that it is a known issue and being actively worked on being resolved is simply being spiteful for no purpose.  Doubly so if they have already cancelled their subscription.  It doesn't help anyone at all, and I doubt the developers need any further "motivation" of that sort.

All in all, in my opinion at least, being frustrated is understandable.  But it not an excuse to throw insults at the people trying to fix the issue, and certainly no excuse for insulting the people who are only trying to give us what little information they have.

[user-removed]

Hmm. More openings for Android than iOS devs....

https://www.spotify.com/uk/jobs/opportunities/all/mobile/all/

[redrum21]

If they know it is a problem, but it is hard to find the issue, why not revert back to older code?  This would make sense would it not?

[user-removed]

@redrum21 This has been suggested several times already in this thread. What seems to make sense to us here and what Spotify believe they need to do don't align.

[jthutcheson]

@redrum21:

Something that sounds like it makes sense could have many unintended consequences.  Without knowing exactly what they did to "fix" ducking, or to add it to their app in general, there is no way to know what effect reverting the change(s) would have unless we tried it.  There is a very good chance that the first thing they tried was indeed rolling it back, but with all the changes made to the UI (which had already been approved and was ready to go), it completely broke something even more important, like being able to set the volume at all.

At which point, there is little choice but to move forward with trying to fix the bug at its root and asking (in vain, most of the time) for some patience and understanding from their users.  A few weeks, in the grand scheme of software updates, is a very very short amount of time.