A case for "Album Shuffle"
Answered
Long post. Sorry.
I’m starting a new feature request for “Shuffle by Album.” Based on what I’ve seen in these community forums, that request has appeared in several different locations and I think the desire for, and importance of, the feature request has been diminished. The first request I can find in the BluOS forums dates from SEVEN YEARS AGO, with new requests and “+1” requests having been added pretty much every year after that. In almost all cases, the request “has been forwarded to the product management and development teams.”
We can also see that, because the feature is still not in the product, the request has been ignored by the BluOS team. For seven years.
Full disclosure: I am not an owner of a BluOS product, though if “Shuffle by album” were added, I would immediately buy either a Node or the NAD CI 580 V2 multi-zone player.
A. There are two separate use cases that I have observed from the comments here and on general audio forums:
- There are many people in the world who prefer to listen to their music “by album,” in other words, listening to the tracks on the album in the original order the artist intended. Yes, there is a place for “shuffle songs” when you want to listen to a variety of artists, but “shuffle albums” is sorely needed for people that would like to listen to a complete album, and then be presented with a new random album which will also play in its entirety.
- Classical music listeners have struggled for years to be able to randomly select “works” and have those works play in their entirety before going to the next random “work.” “Work” here generally equates to “album” in most tagging instances. I have over 9,000 classical music tracks on my NAS, and each “album” is a specific work by a composer. You will find album “Symphony No. 3” by artist “Beethoven” with four tracks in it. I want to listen to those tracks in order, and then have a music player select another random “album” for me.
B. Previous requests for this feature are found in your forums in these threads:
Album shuffle - please. – The Bluesound Support Crew
Album Shuffle and Maximum Track – The Bluesound Support Crew
3 Features that would make me reach for my wallet. – The Bluesound Support Crew
Disable Repeat and Shuffle buttons – The Bluesound Support Crew
Streaming services for jazz and classical – The Bluesound Support Crew
Shuffling – The Bluesound Support Crew
Request: More possibilities to shuffle files – The Bluesound Support Crew (This one is not a specific request for album shuffle, but includes a comment from Scott W. from EIGHT YEARS AGO saying that “Different in-app shuffle options and genre filters are both popular requests and something we've flagged for the development team to look into.”
Not shuffling certain genres – The Bluesound Support Crew
"Album mode" – The Bluesound Support Crew
Random Play Features – The Bluesound Support Crew
Primephonic – The Bluesound Support Crew (not precisely a request for album shuffle, but requests from multiple classical listeners for Primphonic integration)
C. Other products that provide “Album Shuffle”
There are several other products, either media servers, media software, or streaming devices that provide this feature. Some have been around for at least 20 years, while others are relatively new…mostly to overcome limitations in certain products that do NOT support album shuffle. Some notable products are:
- Apple iTunes on either a Mac or PC. The current version of iTunes can shuffle by either Album or Track.
- The iPod Classic (mine is nine years old) can shuffle by Album or Track.
- The Plex Media Server does this
- The dbPowerAmp product “Asset uPNP,” a DLNA media server, is very customizable and provides this feature
- The Kodi Media Server
- The Turtle Beach Audiotron (I have one, and I got it 17 years ago. It is, of course, discontinued.) has a beautiful implementation of Shuffle by Album
- The Logitech Squeezebox (also about 20 years old and discontinued) could do this. Current media software offerings still support the Squeezebox hardware!
- …and there are probably others…
In addition, there are multiple apps for iOS that provide an Album Shuffle capability since it was removed from the stock iOS music player. These apps include “Album Shuffle”, “iAlbum Player”, “Album Mixer”, “Foobar2000”, “Smart Shuffle” and others. All of these apps behave a little differently, but their intent is to allow “Album Shuffle.”
D. Classical music on the upswing
After being ignored for a decade or two, the needs of classical music listeners in the streaming world are beginning to be satisfied. Apple’s iTunes media manager has added tags like “Composer”, “Work”, “Movement” and other classical-specific tags to their offering. In addition, there are several Classical streaming services now, including Idagio (which BluOS supports, thank heavens!) and Primephonic, which was recently acquired by Apple. Both of these streaming services naturally support “Album Shuffle” by the nature that they are classical music oriented. I saw discussions in your forums going back four years about integrating Primphonic based on requests from your users. Now that it’s being made part of Apple Music, I guess that ship has sailed for BluOS.
E. Even Spotify recognizes the need to listen to an album in the order the artist intended. Recently, due to a request from Adele, Spotify confirmed it rolled out a feature for its premium users removing the shuffle option as a default when playing an album. Previously, when you pulled up any album, a shuffle icon would appear just under the green play button, indicating the album would automatically play songs at random instead of in its original order. Now, when you play an album, it will automatically start from the beginning.
On a personal note, after finding out that the stock capability of BluOS for accessing my library on a NAS didn’t include “album shuffle” I decided that I could satisfy my needs by using Asset uPNP, the previously mentioned DLNA media server software. Then, of course, I found out that BluOS doesn’t support DLNA!!!
Bluesound support – if you respond to this thread, please provide something other than “Thank you for your input; we’ll pass it on to product management and development.” After seven years, I think we, the people who have requested Album Shuffle repeatedly, deserve better.
Thanks for listening,
Bob Crum
PS: And I really do promise to buy a Node or NAD CI580V2 if you add this capability!
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Official comment
Hi Bob
Thanks for the feedback - in reading and reviewing your post - you cited other existing threads where your concerns were either addressed or as suggested passed along for further review and consideration.
Unfortunately, I don't have any other feedback to provide than the other cited responses. We have in fact passed your feedback along for future consideration and have had conversations about different shuffle modes in our product development meetings but have no news or update to provide at this time.
Thanks again for taking the time to write and for #LivingHiFi. -
+1 for shuffle.
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So. I posted this four months ago in the "Feature Request" category. Other than one upvote from KriHad (thank you!) there's nothing.
Given that I've seen the Bluesound support crew respond to most other feature requests with a "we'll pass it on" sort of comment, there was nothing for this feature request.
As a potential Bluesound customer, I'm not really very impressed with this level of "support." I think my request is a valid request, and I pointed out in the post the many places that "shuffle by album" has been requested...and ignored.
So, Bluesound people, how about either 1) acknowledging the request 2) telling me it's on the roadmap for a future release or 3) there are no current plans to implement this, in spite of the repeated requests.
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Hi, Tony. Thanks for finally responding.
As a point of accuracy, my concerns were never "addressed" in any of the other threads. "Shuffle by album" is pretty unambiguous, and in none of the other threads where this capability was requested was it ever outlined if or when it would be available. And, quite frankly, there really isn't a workaround.
My basic concern here is that, though the "streaming" side of BlueOS seems to be continuously fixed and enhanced, the "local library/NAS" side of the product is pretty much ignored. The current tags that you support, as documented on your website, are nothing more that the bare basics. iTunes enhanced it's tagging several years ago to add composer and other classically-oriented tags. Most other tagging platforms support many more tags than you do.
So, it just tells me that you don't pay much attention to that side of the product.
I guess what I'm looking for is an acknowledgement from you that shuffle by album is considered a worthy addition to the product. Your response here doesn't even go that far, simply mentioning that you've discussed "different shuffle modes" in product development meetings.
I can only assume that you've been discussing that for over seven years...and still don't have clarity on what you'd like to implement.
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+ 1 for true album shuffle. Thanks to you Rjcrum for your effort!
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I started one of the album shuffle threads referenced in this latest one.
I realize the priority for Bluesound is the support for streaming services since that delivery mode for audio media is the growing market. Sonos faced the same issue a few years ago except that back then the shift away from local library support alienated early adopters, the customers who helped that company establish itself as a leading manufacturer in the wireless audio space. There was a palpable sense of abandonment as the company ignored concerns about an insecure file sharing protocol (SMB v1) and gaslighted requests for album shuffle. Library users like me had to firewall their LAN to prevent the system from updating to unwanted firmware versions that would make some older Sonos players less capable and simply brick others (e.g. CR-100 controller).
But the situation with Bluesound is not the same. ;)
Without any knowledge of the BluOS architecture and your software development policies:
1) Is there a third-party plugin API that would allow the installation of extensions to enhance playback functionality?
2) Any chance of providing the source for the playback logic (under NDA) as well as unit test classes so that a volunteer developer could create album shuffle outside your backlog of feature requests and bug fixes? Of course dev/product reviews as well as QA will still ensue as usual. But if the opportunity existed, I'm sure a dedicated Bluesound user would at least take the development effort off your plate.
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We need SHUFFLE. It is very upsetting, how you ignore such a basic need such as album, song, artist, shuffle. As listed above the orginal Ipod had shuffle, and you refuse to listen to user requests. I have over 1500 stored CDs, I would like to be surprised by my own library, the scrolling to find an album is not practical when we have so many of them. Honestly, I am in the market for a new player / storage unit. If somebody has any recommendations outside the NAD / BluOS brand I will welcome them. Lets all leave this behind brand behind!.
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+1 for Album shuffle.
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+1
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Happy to see this request alive again! Basic functionality, yes please. :)
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Wow. Three additional “+1s” in a day!
After 8 years of waiting.
Bluesound…once again, how long can it possibly take you to prioritize onto the product roadmap a shuffle/random play mode that has existed in other products for 20 years?
PLEASE give us shuffle-by-album!
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As a migrator from Squeezebox, I am astounded that this feature is Still NOT IMPLEMENTED! As repeatedly pointed out: THIS IS BASIC FUNCTIONALITY! After more than 7 years, it is time to implement this. Also it seems like you don't have a software development team. You need a team for both. As pointed out, you have competitors, and they ALL HAVE IMPLEMENTED THIS ALREADY, YEARS AGO! As pointed out, your REFUSAL TO PROVIDE ANY REAL COMMUNICATION IN THESE REQUESTS IS A MAJOR TURNOFF TO YOUR CUSTOMERS! You come off as arrogant, unwilling to engage, and a gasslighter/staller. I am continually amazed by the callous and discounting attitude provided. Requests that are popular and older deserve ACTUAL INFORMATION and not just THE BRUSH OFF!!! (Which is what the stock reply is.)
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Keep those cards and letters coming, Bluesound community! Maybe they'll start listening to us.
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Hi. Returning to this thread a year later just because I made some decisions, and purchases, during that time. There has clearly been a lot of product activity in the streaming world, and one of those introduced during the past year was the Wiim Pro. This little box, a bit smaller than the Node, offers pretty incredible specs and integration for just $150. Four months ago I got one to try it out. That led to a purchase of three additional units for my four-zone whole house audio system. Total outlay was $600, or the price for just one Node (I would have needed four!) and certainly more affordable than the four-zone NAD CI 580 V2 at $1600. For my purposes, the Wiim Pro is a wonderful solution at a very affordable price. I’m sure there are those here who can find all sorts of faults with it compared to the Node, but if you want multi-zone streaming with good music service integration, at a very affordable price, it’s hard to beat. Also, Wiim support is pretty amazing. They are incredibly responsive on the forums, and they are rolling out software updates fixing bugs and adding features at an amazing rate.
I thank Bluesound for introducing me to what can be done in a whole-house multi-zone streaming system, though!
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Rjcrum, I migrated to BluOS from Sonos a few months ago. I can now index all my music files and not have to divide them into several libraries and load one library at a time as needed. For that, BluOS has been a plus. The new Node and Pulse M sound better than equivalent Sonos units also. No album shuffle is a drag though. Does the Wiim system have it?
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Well, yes and no. The Wiim doesn't have an SMB-equivalent connection to be able to directly index disc drives, though it is on their roadmap. (see WiiM Pro Roadmap : Audio Help Center (wiimhome.com)). That being said, they DO support DLNA, so I browse my music library on a Synology NAS running Asset UPnP media server...which offers shuffle by album. There's a bug in Asset that I discovered that causes the "random" albums to be played back in alphabetical order (how weird is that!?) but that is going to be fixed in the next imminent update.
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+1 for Album Shuffle. I had been about to commit to replacing my Sonos units with Bluesound, but without Album Shuffle I’ll give it a miss. My iPod could do this 20 years ago…
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Another +1 for album shuffle. I have nearly 2000 albums on my Nas and, like the poster earlier, would like to be surprised by what is played.
Random album is a feature on so many other music players including free software, so please can we have it in bluos....Thanks
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Great idea
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I’m glad to see people are still giving “shuffle by album” a +1, even though I moved on to WiiM. I’m now up to a total of six independent zones in my house, and loving the product.
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