Give us your feedback - 0.9.0

[Richard]

Hey everyone,

Following on from our previous thread on 0.8.8, we've started up this thread to gather feedback from you on 0.9.0.

We want to hear what you love, what you hate, and any other emotions you have towards the app.

You'll find a list of everything that's changed in the app in our release notes here. And we'll be keeping this post updated with the changes we're making, along with where you can give us further feedback.

What we've changed:

1. The app should be a lot quicker now. So if you were affected by any slow behaviour previously, this shouldn't be an issue any more.

2. Clicking anywhere in the Now Playing box, rather than just the album art, will bring you straight to the song. This was reported here.

Where you can give us further feedback with your comments and kudos:

1. Change the white interface [we're currently reaching to users about this directly]

2. Changes to the activity feed -

     i. Bring back the old activity feed

     ii. The Favourites feature

     iii.Greater control of content in the feed: 

3. Bring back the total playlst length:

4. Filter option on artist pages

5. Go back to the old artist layout 

6. Ability to view all Facebook friends in the Follow tab:

7. View all playlist followers: 

8. Block/Remove followers 

9. Separate artists and friends

10. Remove 'who to follow'

11. Revert the font back to the original size (or provide an option to do so)

12. Restore 'View as Album List'

Thanks for all your support. We appreciate that there are a lot of changes going on at the moment and it can be a bumpy road at times. But we're confident that you'll like where we're going.

All your opinions matter and go into making Spotify the best product it can be. Keep it coming!

[vmounts]

The thing developers, or more likely managers, need to realize is that most users do not give a fig about how webifying the interface will simplify your development efforts. No one cares. I'm a software developer myself and I don't care. Users just want something that works well and does so with reasonable responsiveness. Most people are using at most two different platforms or even just one. Having "sameness" across all platforms just isn't important.

Anyway, I had serious performance issues after the recent releases. I completely uninstalled and re-installed and things were working well. That only lasted a couple days though. I'm officially installing the old version and using the update blocking trick. I assume at some point this will no longer work but I'll do it until that day and then find another service to use.

[PrinceWatercres]

I looked at my CPU usage when I had to End Task the player since it wanted to hang endlessly and not respond.

IT WAS AT 99%. NINETY. NINE. PERCENT.

You couldn't fix this before updating v0.9 further, guys?

[Gabhan]

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@PrinceWatercres wrote:

I looked at my CPU usage when I had to End Task the player since it wanted to hang endlessly and not respond.

IT WAS AT 99%. NINETY. NINE. PERCENT.

You couldn't fix this before updating v0.9 further, guys?

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Since the devs don't do any testing whatsoever, and it isn't a problem for everyone, the chances of them being able to repeat this are pretty slim. And if they can't repeat it, they can't fix it. The only way you could really tackle this one (as a developer myself), would be to find the steps required to repeat this 'at will'. Until that time, any fixes would be merely 'lucky stabs in the dark'.

[brudy]

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@darksonance wrote:

Wow another update and  guess what, it's still is crap. Barley loads. Click on anything and it freezes. 

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Sounds like the latest update is indeed a load of Barley 🙂

[TrevBlu19]

Can you guys please add back STAR THE WHOLE ALBUM, so i don't have to click every single song in an album? Thank you!  Oh yeah and 100 percent cpu needs to go.

[Peter__]

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@Trev19 wrote:

Can you guys please add back STAR THE WHOLE ALBUM, so i don't have to click every single song in an album? Thank you!  Oh yeah and 100 percent cpu needs to go.

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If you drag the name of the album onto the "Starred" playlist on the left it will automatically star the whole album for you. Just a work around 😉 

Peter

[TrevBlu19]

Thanks Peter 🙂

[jayy]

Last night received an update 0.9.0.129.

These updates are not GETTING any better... I really don't know what is going but I'm starting to not have patients anymore. Also what did they change, break, fix, remove, in this release?

I just know it is SLOW!!! still... for both Mac and Windows. As I run both.

FIRE the developers and HIRE developers that knows what they are doing...

[miskidomleka]

@jayy

For example, they fixed the cache bug (cache location reverting to default on Spotify restart)

[AbsolutelyNoFB]

Was on a nice holiday from the Spotify's beta test boards... that was relaxing. The v0.8.5 client has been working nicely, BTW. Until tonight.

There was one funny thing that happened with v0.8.5 about a week ago. It spontaneously reset my settings so the cache went up from 1GB to 10GB, high quality streams were turned off, etc. There is still a bug in v0.8.5 that resets the balance levels on my speakers from time to time. That's annoying. But I don't sweat the small stuff 😉

Alas, I had to leave my holiday and come back to the beta test boards because Spotify started spontaneously disconnecting. It took about 5 seconds to find the new "horrible update" thread.

So is there anything in the latest version that is worth updating for? Is the UI still that retina burning half bright / half dark abomination? Is the new version still slow and generally lame and buggy?

Cheers 🙂

[mutantdog]

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@AbsolutelyNoFB wrote:

Was on a nice holiday from the Spotify's beta test boards... that was relaxing.

So is there anything in the latest version that is worth updating for?

Cheers 🙂

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Must have been a nice little break you had, you seem very optimistic!

Perhaps a few minutes with 0.9.0 will bring you back down a little.

[AbsolutelyNoFB]

@mutantdog

Must have been a nice little break you had, you seem very optimistic!

Perhaps a few minutes with 0.9.0 will bring you back down a little.

It has been a nice break. Once you accept that Spotify is a mediocre company that is owned and controlled by record labels and other not so good companies such as Goldman Sachs and Coca-Cola, the only thing one can do is enjoy the good things while they last. For me, those good things are the v0.8.5 client and poking around finding interesting music. I highly doubt there will ever be a Spotify desktop client that is as nice and enjoyable to use as the v0.8.3/v.0.8.5 clients.

As for the new horrible update, aka v0.9.0, I'm not going to willingly use any Spotify client that still has that terrible half bright / half dark theme. If Spotify had ONE intelligent caring person in the appropriate decision-making position, that retina burning monstrosity would be gone. That really is the foundational reality -- Spotify doesn't have ONE intelligent caring person who has any say in product management / development. It's that simple.

It's like Voltaire once said, IIRC, "I've decided to be happy because it's better for my health". I figure by the time v0.8.5 stops working, there will be other services to choose from. Meanwhile, the happiness I get from enjoying something good, ephemeral as it may be, is working pretty well 😉

[Bachor]

How long will I have to wait more for cache path update?! (will stop resetting to default one). Spotify, I am giving you ONE week more to repair that or... I move to d-.-r or w-.-p. You have one week starting from now.

I work as programmer and one week for repairing broken path is a way too much. So I advice to all of you, give them time but don't wait till the end of world. If they don't make their software "stable" and they let you be a test-rabbit it is not worth paying for it. They should pay you for testing their software.

[Zeromantix]

Bachor: This seems to be fixed in 0.9.0.129 which is rolling out now. I got it two days ago i think.

http://community.spotify.com/t5/Help-Desktop-Linux-Mac-and/Changelog-for-Spotify-on-Windows-version-...

[mosmi]

Wow. I'm so happy to have reverted back to 0.8.5! I can see what you guys mean. We've lost so much.

This version loads in seconds for me, (compared to minutes for 0.9.0) keeps playlists organised just how I want 'em, has a smaller font so I can see more songs on the page, and so on and so on…

Christ knows what they're on at Spotify Central. The latest few versions have been an almighty clusterf*ck. 

Glad to hear it's not just me who has been so downhearted about the awful direction they're taking the desktop app in. Just wish they'd actually listen to their customers. Or interact with them, at the very least. When was the last time a member of staff posted to the thread?

[BigKev57]

@mosmi: I'm glad that you can join us in using Spotify when it was at it's peak. I wish you a happy listening experience 🙂

There has been no moderator on this thread since Sam redirected a complaint to this thread 2 weeks ago (page 26). It's patently obvious to the long term contributors here that Spotify do not really give a monkeys. This forum is just here as a fantasy. To make us believe that what we say has some effect when it obviously does not. The request/idea of just being able to delete a radio station has been here over a year with many kudos. Action taken? Erm.... zero. 

Having been involved in the comments and complaints about Spotify going back to the beginning of February i have realised that we are flogging a dead horse if we are looking for any improvements, roll backs etc that we request. Spotify thinks it knows best. The best we can hope for is that the earlier versions (0.8.5 and such) remain available to us for as long as possible.  

[BigKev57]

Just as an example i have written to the Moderator Per twice in the past two weeks and he has not even read my mail let alone alswered it. Spotify Cares? Does it F***

[Peter__]

Per is a community manager not a moderator, and they are extremely busy people! 

The general rule for Spotify support here on the community is not to do it via PM since it removes the community spirit (they also do get a lot of PMs!). To be fair if you PMed me asking for help I would probably just point you to create a topic too 😛 

Peter

[BigKev57]

@Peter: LMFAO!!!!!!!!!!! Per is a Spotify community manager and to busy to reply to a paying customer?? That just about says it all.

Well in my opinion it was a personal matter although i did also comment in a thread (no comment came back there either). I replied to him in pm as he wrote to me telling me my rank had been upgraded. However, just a few days later i was moved down the ranks again 🙂 Just thought i would let him know. More Spotify rubbish organisation imo. I'm not really interested in kissing moderator arse. Just inreceiving the product i pay for.

Kevin

[Gabhan]

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@BigKev57 wrote:

@Peter: LMFAO!!!!!!!!!!! Per is a Spotify community manager and to busy to reply to a paying customer?? That just about says it all.

Well in my opinion it was a personal matter although i did also comment in a thread (no comment came back there either). I replied to him in pm as he wrote to me telling me my rank had been upgraded. However, just a few days later i was moved down the ranks again 🙂 Just thought i would let him know. More Spotify rubbish organisation imo. I'm not really interested in kissing moderator arse. Just inreceiving the product i pay for.

Kevin

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I got the exact same message to say my rank was upgraded, but then it moved down the ranks again. I PM'ed him - as the message came as a PM to me!  Just like you, I didn't even get a stock response. Just silence. Spotify Community Managers - too busy to talk to their customers. Just about sums up the Spotify customer experience!!!