[Desktop][Playlists] Fix playlist sorting discrepancy between Desktop and Mobile apps

[bricetuttle]

For the last 5+ years, I have kept playlists full of albums, and they would behave very logically. When I clicked "date added" to sort by date and put my newest discoveries at the top, and started playing the songs in the order displayed, it worked wonderfully. The album tracks were in their correct order (not reversed even though my playlist was in reverse chronological order), and the songs would play one after another going down the list.

Sometime recently, that all got REALLY messed up in the desktop app.

Now, when I sort my playlists by "date added" the album tracks are SHOWN in reverse order. The strange thing is they still PLAY in the correct order... mostly. The timestamps are apparently less accurate now, too, so sometimes what's playing will jump around a lot. 

In the mobile app, everything still works great. 

Soooo.... can we just put it back the way it was, and make the desktop app work more like the mobile app again? Thanks to all!

[szainmehdi]

This is a deal-breaker for me as well. Starting to look into other streaming services.

[CarlosE]

Hey @bricetuttle and @szainmehdi,

Thanks for reaching out to the Community.

As a first step, try logging out, restarting your devices and your router, and logging back in. If that doesn't make the difference, it's worth running a clean reinstall of the desktop app by following these steps. This will make sure that any corrupted files from previous installations get removed.

If this behavior persists, could you let us know if this happens with any playlist you have or just with some specific ones?

We'd also like to know the exact Spotify version you're running.

Keep us posted. We'll be on the lookout.

[kick_ball_boy]

Yes! Thank you! I have no idea why anybody would want their albums to be out of order regardless of how they sort the playlist! This is ridiculous, and now my 1000+song playlists can't be listened to because I added albums in, and now if I want to listen by recents, the album plays backwards!

Spotify, nobody wanted this change. Nobody listens to albums backwards. If someone really wanted that for some sort of "hidden message," they're already used to adding the occasional album in backwards. Please revert this or give us an option!

[bricetuttle]

Hi Carlos,

Thanks for responding! I wish a reboot would help, but this is designed behavior that needs to be fixed by the UX team — it's not a bug. To us, it just doesn't make sense that an album would ever play out of order, no matter how you sort the playlist. It also doesn't make sense that a playlist would switch direction, sometimes going top-to-bottom but then other times going bottom-to-top.

If the desktop app would just use the same logic as the mobile app, we'd be thrilled 🙂

[Eni]

Hey @bricetuttle, 

Thanks for getting back in touch. 

Would you mind sending us a screen recording so we can take a closer look at the issue?

We'll be on the lookout.

[kick_ball_boy]

@Eni 

Here i have attached a video showing this erroneous album behavior that only started since the update to 1.1.58.820.g2ae50076-a (desktop) from the previous version I was on, which was before the desktop/mobile design merge.

As you can see, when I add an album to a playlist, it adds fine, but when I try to sort the playlist by "recently added," the album order inverts (wrong behavior). The album should always stay in order, like it does on the iOS app (that I have) and previous versions of the desktop app. This glitch is new to the version I listed earlier. I saw other comments saying this glitch is also appearing on mobile now, which makes me hesitant to update, but either way I am unable to test on iOS because the newer mobile app has the problem where playlist orders are being sorted incorrectly by most recently edited instead of the playlist order.

The behavior should be changed back to treating albums as individual units when choosing sort order in playlist, so whether we search by most recent or oldest added, any album that is playing should play in order. The way it is now, I can't listen to a playlist by recently added because albums will play backwards (wrong behavior). 

Thank you.

[Novy]

Hey @kick_ball_boy, 

Thanks for getting back to us with this info. 

We understand that this used to work differently. However, we tested this from our end and the behavior seems to be expected with the New Desktop App. Currently, playlists will count a song as an unit and not the albums. This is the reason why the order changes. 

In this case, we'd recommend leaving your feedback in this thread, as it's being monitored by the right folks.

You can also have a look in our Idea Exchange to see if someone else has already made a similar suggestion. If there isn't one, you can give these steps a go and submit your idea so that other users can also support it. The higher the number of votes an idea gets, the more likely it is for it to be implemented.

If anything else comes up, we're always a message away. 

Cheers.