Bugzilla – Bug 11314
Need a graceful failure if device loses contact with server/wifi
Last modified: 2011-05-09 14:54:48 UTC
If Fab4 loses contact with its server, we need a graceful failure state for each of its modes: * When playing a song-- finish playing the buffer, then display an error message? Currently what happens is the song ends but the timer continues counting up on the left, and down from -59:59 on the right. Also, I can continue to navigate the menus as though nothing was wrong. Are these cached? * When idle-- display an error message for 30 seconds. Then revert to the selected screensaver. * When off-- ??? We should also have similar behaviors if it loses connection to the network.
It occurs to me-- our solution here should also address multiple server environments. What happens if we lose contact with one server, but not another? What happens if we lose contact to SN, but not SC? Or vice versa?
*** Bug 11315 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Merging 11314 and 11315 to a single bug to cover telling the user when the network connectivity is broken appropriately. Note that even if the network goes down, the product can still play music and photos off the USB and SD storage devices. I wonder if we should put up a message only when the user actually tries to do something that requires a connection.
I noticed today when my FAB4 could not connect to the server it simply came up with an error message of "Problem Connecting". GO back or Try again. Below all of this could we add text that says this There was a problem connecting to your server. Some things to check are: 1. Make sure the server is running. 2. Check any firewalls located on the server. 3. Any text we think may help. 4. Any text we think may help. I think this may help our customers have an understanding of what is causing this issues..rather than leaving them with no possible clue on why their unit will not connect.
When off, there is no need for an error. Only show an error if/when the user tries to perform an action that requires the connection. As per the other two cases, I like Dan's suggestions. Anoop's approach makes sense, but it would be nicer if the steps to resolve were located in our (now-standard) help screens. Even better would be to contextualize the help to the use case if possible (i.e. if squeezecenter connection is lost vs. squeezenetwork). Would like to know the most common contexts for connection failure before proposing text. Anoop, what was happening when your connection failed? Were you playing music or performing another action?
The server was turned off when I was trying to Connect to it. I do not mind the idea of a help section but there was not help option from the error screen. In the top right hand corner there was simply a musical note button that did nothing.
Cool, then we just need to make sure the current diagnostics screen is available from the error screen. The musical note button is actually the link to the "now playing" screen. That button is supposed to go away from setup before our final setup firmware release.
We should NOT think of the Diagnostics screen as a catch-all for providing help to users. The Diagnostics screen is exceedingly useful, but is more aimed at helping a customer *after* they contact Support. We need to provide useful, informative Help screens that provide options a customer can try to solve their problem. I opened bug 11456 to discuss error text in general. Whereas this bug addresses only server/wifi errors. We can combine these as you see fit. Also related, I opened bug 11457 to discuss the Help page structure with regard to Support and the Diagnostics page.
IMO losing network connectivity and server connectivity are two distinctly different scenarios. Yes, both need to fail gracefully, but they need to be handled completely differently whenever one or the other situation occurs. Here's what I'm seeing: After playing around with network setup, the Fab4 is detached from any network after wireless authentication failure. If you reboot there's no indication that you're completely disconnected. First, it tries to connect to mysqueezebox.com, which of course fails. If you manage to break out of that and end up in the Home menu, then you're presented with a My Music option. Under My Music I see the local server. Probably the first indication that anything is wrong is that the local server no longer has a checkbox. Try connecting to that and it will fail. Didn't previous SB firmwares just send you straight into the network setup when the network connection was lost?
Created attachment 5454 [details] example of bad error screen. (taken maybe 6 weeks ago, so may be out-dated.) When Fab4 loses its connection to the network, the error message that appears is broken in several ways: 1. At top-right you do not have access to the "more help" button. 2. The error text is way too ambiguous. I pulled the ethernet cable from the back of the player. The text says only, "There is a problem connecting to <server-name>". It should be able to provde better feedback than that. 3. The options at the bottom are inappropriate. The first is "try again" which is fine, but the second is "choose player" which is not appropriate for Fab4. (at another time I saw the second option say, "Skip this step" which is equally inappropriate.) If we lose the ethernet connection, that should be easy to indicate to the user. If we lose the wifi connection, that's trickier to provide directed feedback but we still can improve what we have.
Moving to the product SqueezePlay because this bug appears to apply to any player based on that application code. Feel free to move it back if it's specific to the original product.
I don't think this is super-complicated. If idle: do nothing If music is playing: play rest of buffer, then show error If user takes action that results in a network error: show error As shown in bug 12435, we have checked in strings for 2 cases: ethernet and wireless. Wireless case: "Connection Problem We can't detect a wired connection. Please check your ethernet cable, and make sure your network is running and available. Try Again > Choose Different Network >" Ethernet Case: "Connection Problem We can't detect a wireless connection. Please check to make sure your network is running and available." Try Again > Choose Different Network >" --------- Removing SLT tag, as this copy has already been entered.
Work: point to diagnostics screen on failure screen
This bug is unlcear in what is to be done. If there is additional work we want to do regarding overal network failure messaging, that would be a different bug.
Moving lower-priority bugs to next target
Tom is no longer available to us
Radio & Fab 4 hav implemented error messages for loss of network connectivity 7.6.0 .r9430 radio: 9432