How is it that smart playlists are still broken??

[Surf Monkey]

Shame on Apple. This is simply ridiculous. We're at software 1.1.1 and smart playlists still don't work correctly in any way. I have a huge amount of music and I need smart playlists in order to make sure that the right songs go on iPhone and that they're organized into useful groupings. I've owned iPhone for MONTHS now and I'm still not able to do this, thanks to Apple's crap software. What the hell is going on here? Why is Apple taking so long to fix such a basic issue? It's frustrating to no end.

 

[Code Monkey]

I wager the equation goes something like this:

Pertinent Facts
1. The vast majority of iPod users are, functionally speaking, idiots at using them.
2. Smartlists can't be used by idiots effectively.
3. Current iPod developers don't fully understand legacy code that is largely unchanged from 2004*

Conclusion: The vast majority of the users will never notice or care if they work right and correcting this "minor" aspect of the various new iPod firmwares would have delayed shipping until Q1 2008, which is unacceptable to the shareholders.

Keep in mind, this is the same company that broke live updating of smartlists about a 1/3 of the way through the 4G cycle and didn't get around to finally fixing it until months after the 5G had shipped.



* - speculation, but it's strongly supported by the fact that smartlists have received no significant functional change since sometime in the iTunes 4.X era. The only thing they added of significance was a scroll bar to the rules lists for easier use of large lists. They've added in some new flags since then, but all are still broken after countless updates. In fact, as best I can recall, the only new criteria that involved a significant change to the firmware that they ever got working on the iPod is the skip flag/count. All the ones involving file type as a bit flag as opposed to the originally implemented "kind" are as broken as ever and they were introduced with the very first podcast support in iTunes.

 

[Surf Monkey]

Sadly, I agree with all that. As I said in the first post: shame on Apple. Offering broken features is worse than offering no features IMO.

 

[swampduck]

Offering features, even if broken, gets people to buy with the hope that it will be working properly in the next update...not offering them at all keeps people waiting to buy with the release that offers it, even if it is broken and needs the next update to fix it...even if said update is a year away, if at all.

 

[Code Monkey]

Offering features, even if broken, gets people to buy with the hope that it will be working properly in the next update...not offering them at all keeps people waiting to buy with the release that offers it, even if it is broken and needs the next update to fix it...even if said update is a year away, if at all.

The problem is that I'm not seeing the difference. A number of prominent iLounge users have either purchased and returned the newer iPods based on the borked software or, like me, they're simply not considering a purchase because of the borked software. Of those people who actually use this feature, it's not a, "it's lame but I can wait..." type scenario. It's a, "I literally cannot use this device like this", scenario. The early iPhone adopters are stuck because they have the phone contract forcing them to hold onto the device, but otherwise, same difference: Apple is costing themselves real sales with this broken feature because it's not something you can just shrug off. I effortlessly manage 170GB of files with a 8GB nano because of smartlists - I can't very well afford the trade off of going back to the cave and manually managing 170GB of files on a 8GB 3G nano, touch, or iPhone (or even the ~149GB classic) just because they gave them pretty interfaces.

The majority of people who actually care about this issue aren't buying so they might as well have not offered it and simply took the flack for now instead of having people continually grumbling when they fail to fix it after yet another update.

 

[Dim]

1. The vast majority of iPod users are, functionally speaking, idiots at using them.

While this is probably true, I think the majority also have relatively small music libraries compared to some of us who have 10,20,etc times the music that can fit on the device. No ipod user I know even knows what a smart playlist is.

Regardless, I still find it puzzling that this hasn't been addressed.

 

[Surf Monkey]

Of those people who actually use this feature, it's not a, "it's lame but I can wait..." type scenario. It's a, "I literally cannot use this device like this", scenario. The early iPhone adopters are stuck because they have the phone contract forcing them to hold onto the device, but otherwise, same difference: Apple is costing themselves real sales with this broken feature because it's not something you can just shrug off. I effortlessly manage 170GB of files with a 8GB nano because of smartlists - I can't very well afford the trade off of going back to the cave and manually managing 170GB of files on a 8GB 3G nano, touch, or iPhone (or even the ~149GB classic) just because they gave them pretty interfaces.

I couldn't agree with this statement any more. I bought the iPhone on release day fully expecting a firmly established feature to work correctly on the device. It isn't as if Apple added smart playlists to iPhone for the first time. Smart playlists have been around for years. The fact that they don't work correctly with iPhone means that I'm stuck with a broken device that I paid many hundreds of dollars for. How do you think people would feel if they bought, say, a washing machine for $700 and then realized that the spin cycle didn't work? That's basically the same situation. A core function, one that I rely on to make the device useful to me, simply doesn't work and Apple shows NO signs of fixing it any time soon. It's insulting and frustrating.

 

[Code Monkey]

While this is probably true, I think the majority also have relatively small music libraries compared to some of us who have 10,20,etc times the music that can fit on the device. No ipod user I know even knows what a smart playlist is.

Even if I had a 1TB iPod with 75% free space, I still couldn't use it without functional smartlists. Everything from my podcast managment, my mix lists, my audiobooks, literally 99% of my listening is through smartlists - the capacity differential is just an exponential aggravation if they don't work properly.

However, yes, I'm certain I am a rather niche user, and I myself have argued that Apple has little financial interest in catering to the niche user. Of course, in this case, it was Apple itself that created the niche, so it's a little more frustrating they're not bothering to address it going on five months after the iPhone shipped and two months after the other iPods shipped. The issue is who Apple wants for their customer. As I observe in my smartlist paper, most Apple products are geared towards trained chimps out of the box but power users, if they put in a little effort, generally find them amazing as well. The issue with smartlists and the current gen of iPods/iPhones is that they're only good for trained chimps and power users are left in the cold.

 

[Surf Monkey]

I don't know if it's fair to characterize people like Code Monkey and myself as niche users. Why do I say that? Let's consider the number of people who have hacked iPhones and/or unlocked them. It's been said many times in the past here on this forum that hackers and unlockers are a niche, yet Apple reports that they estimate somewhere close to 1 in 6 iPhones sold are hacked or unlocked. That's a HUGE percentage. One has to assume, based on that number, that there are a very large number of very savvy iPhone owners out there. Working from that assumption, it's fair to imagine that many many people do fully understand and make use most iPhone features, including smart playlists.

Personally, I'm very much like Code Monkey in my usage patterns. I have roughly 60 gig of music in my main iTunes library. I use smart playlists for practically everything. I have 23 active smart playlists currently that help me manage exactly which songs I move to my two iPods and one iPhone. I also use them almost exclusively when listening to music on my desktop computer. I honestly believe that many tens of thousands of iPhone users do the same thing I do. Therefore, it's really all the more perplexing that Apple doesn't make fixing smart playlist functionality on iPhone a higher priority. If smart playlists were some obscure feature that only a few hundred iPod/iPhone/iTunes users took advantage of, that would be one thing. But the fact that they're a very high profile feature across the entire iXxx line, it's a virtual certainty that a huge number of people use them. Furthermore, the smart playlist function isn't only broken on the iPhone. The iPod Classic has some serious issues with them as well. That's just bad quality control and customer service on Apple's part. Period. End of sentence.

 

[e2mtt]

Could someone please clarify this issue for me?

I currently have a 8GB 2G Nano, and use a series of smart playlists to cycle music from my 55GB library on and off of my Ipod. (5* rated always on the player, other songs get cycled on and off the Nano based on how recently the song was added, played, and ratings.) The only flaw with this system is often I have to sync twice in a row to get everything updated. (Well actually there are a lot of shortcomings in Apple's simplistic playlisting... but I digress. It currently works OK.)

I am looking at getting an Iphone, and assumed I could use it the same way...???

 

[Surf Monkey]

iPhone has problems with lists that involve things that are time and playcount sensitive. "Least recently played" and "recently added" are the two lists I (try to) use on iPhone. It syncs the correct songs but when you open either one of the lists, it includes the songs from BOTH lists, making them functionally useless. That's my experience with it. Others have similar stories. iPhone picks up the right songs but doesn't sort them into the correct lists. Furthermore, the lists are NOT updated dynamically when songs are played on the iPhone. On my "least recently played" list, if I play a song from it, the song should disappear from the list. That's the correct behavior and it works right on the Classic. Not on iPhone.

 

[e2mtt]

Thanks Surf Monkey...

That sounds bad. On the other hand, if it does sync the right songs, (although they may show up wrong in the lists) can you then play all the songs on the Iphone in a shuffle? And then do their playcounts get updated and the correct songs removed on the next sync?

 

[Surf Monkey]

Yes, I can play songs from the playlists either by browsing by artist/album or by shuffling and they do update on sync but that's really not good enough. I'd like to do even more with smart playlists on iPhone but as it is, my hands are tied.

 

[Dim]

I don't know if it's fair to characterize people like Code Monkey and myself as niche users. Why do I say that? Let's consider the number of people who have hacked iPhones and/or unlocked them. It's been said many times in the past here on this forum that hackers and unlockers are a niche, yet Apple reports that they estimate somewhere close to 1 in 6 iPhones sold are hacked or unlocked. That's a HUGE percentage. One has to assume, based on that number, that there are a very large number of very savvy iPhone owners out there. Working from that assumption, it's fair to imagine that many many people do fully understand and make use most iPhone features, including smart playlists.

There's no hard evidence about how many people use smart playlists, but let's get one thing clear. Just because someone doesn't use or need them, doesn't mean they're not savvy or are chimps or idiots like you monkeys like to imply.

Oh, and it was a monkey who called himself a niche user.

I agree with everything you monkeys are saying as there's no excuse for something like this not working. But sorry if not enough people are fussing about it for Apple to pick up the pace on this. I think that's clear evidence of it being niche.

 

[Surf Monkey]

There's no hard evidence about how many people use smart playlists, but let's get one thing clear. Just because someone doesn't use or need them, doesn't mean they're not savvy or are chimps or idiots like you monkeys like to imply.

What's with the vitriol? I never suggested that people who don't use smart playlists are neophytes or lacking savvy or whatever. You added that element yourself. My only point is that smart playlists aren't a secret, are something that a LOT of people use and that power users are even more likely to use them.

Oh, and it was a monkey who called himself a niche user.

I never said anything other than that. I know he called himself that. I was responding to his characterization, not your posts.

I agree with everything you monkeys are saying as there's no excuse for something like this not working. But sorry if not enough people are fussing about it for Apple to pick up the pace on this. I think that's clear evidence of it being niche.

Do you know that "not enough people are fussing about it" or is that just speculation? Could it be that Apple has other priorities, even in the face of complaints from their consumers? There are any number of reasons why Apple is choosing to ignore this issue, consumer feedback being only one amongst many potential motivations.

 

[Dim]

What's with the vitriol? I never suggested that people who don't use smart playlists are neophytes or lacking savvy or whatever. You added that element yourself. My only point is that smart playlists aren't a secret, are something that a LOT of people use and that power users are even more likely to use them.

No, I'm not the one who wrote that the current gen are only good for trained chimps and power users are left in the cold. So no I didn't add that element myself, I'm pretty sure it was a monkey.

I never said anything other than that. I know he called himself that. I was responding to his characterization, not your posts.

It's nice that you talk about people in the room in the 3rd person, but some of us could misunderstand you.

Do you know that "not enough people are fussing about it" or is that just speculation?

Common sense would dictate that if there were enough people fussing about it, it would've been addressed by now. Enough complainers addressed the price drop "fiasco", enough complainers made the screen issues known. Look around the web. The number of users complaining of certain smart playlist functionality not working pales in comparison to other issues that people have complained about (screens, lack of apps, etc.)

 

[Code Monkey]

No, I'm not the one who wrote that the current gen are only good for trained chimps and power users are left in the cold. So no I didn't add that element myself, I'm pretty sure it was a monkey.

It was, and I stand by it 100%. It's the lowest common denomenator method: add music, have interface to browse to music, hit play, i.e., trained chimp territory. I'm not saying that isn't a valid way of using players, just that it requires no more effort or sophistication than a trained chimp, hence my comment.

If you aren't using smartlists, I really don't know why you're using an iPod. I'm sure people have their reasons, but they fall squarely in either the warm fuzzies department or 3rd party product integration (which is another Apple failed to handle well with the new iPods ). If all you're interested in is syncing some music to a player and either browsing to said music to listen or using a fixed playlist then you can save yourself a lot of money by buying any of the myriad other players out there that do the same things cheaper and arguably better in that many are more software agnostic.

The iPod has two things that make it genuinely stand out: incredible marketing and smartlists. Unfortunately, Apple knows all too well that it's the incredible marketing that got most of their customers.

 

[Dim]

It was, and I stand by it 100%. It's the lowest common denomenator method: add music, have interface to browse to music, hit play, i.e., trained chimp territory. I'm not saying that isn't a valid way of using players, just that it requires no more effort or sophistication than a trained chimp, hence my comment.

You forget about those of us that listen to music differently. I think of what I want to listen to and choose it, not have the player dictate to me what I want to listen to, because more often than not, I'm skipping half the stuff because I'm not in the mood for it. Maybe different people have different relationships to their music, but I've never liked a jukebox style of music playback and rarely had a need for any kind of playlist, less yet a smart playlist.

If all you're interested in is syncing some music to a player and either browsing to said music to listen or using a fixed playlist then you can save yourself a lot of money by buying any of the myriad other players out there that do the same things cheaper and arguably better in that many are more software agnostic.

I disagree. Most players I've tried fail in some way to please me as much as the ipod has. How many have gapless playback? Good UI? Good synching software? That's what sells the ipod for me. Oh, and audio quality. I like the ipod sound signature more than other players. But of course, my opinion is incorrect I'm sure.

Unfortunately, Apple knows all too well that it's the incredible marketing that got most of their customers.

I agree that marketing is the primary reason for most of its customers, but without a good product to market, it would've not been nearly as successful. You can sprinkle sugar on dog food, but people will eventually realize it's still dog food.

 

[swampduck]

It was, and I stand by it 100%. It's the lowest common denomenator method: add music, have interface to browse to music, hit play, i.e., trained chimp territory. I'm not saying that isn't a valid way of using players, just that it requires no more effort or sophistication than a trained chimp, hence my comment.

the first ipods were marketed and sold with precisely this concept in mind. The first ipod commercial shows a guy dragging music to his ipod, dancing to the music and leaving his apartment...no Smartlist even existed than, so they were gearing it towards the lowest common denominator...and wow! you wrote a 30 page article on how to make Smartlists....listening shouldn't be as hard as you have outlined in your mini Thesis...still a decent read though

 

[Code Monkey]

....listening shouldn't be as hard as you have outlined in your mini Thesis...still a decent read though

Listening isn't hard; however, if what you want is "custom radio stations" instead of either just listening to Apple's anemic shuffle or playing the same album you've heard 100X then you're going to have to use smartlists and you're going to have to put a little effort into them. If anything, the system should be made more complex, not easier, and certainly not halfassed as they are on the current gen iPods/iPhone.

Plus, as I've said elsewhere, even the most complex system I illustrate is a simplified version of what I've got going on with my iPod. It's still not anything I'd consider close to hard, it just requires you bother to learn how the system works.