Major Upgrade for HomeSeer Amazon Echo Skill!

[Sgt. Shultz]

While I haven't used it I think you can talk to the Echo through the Amazon app.

I didn't see an area to do that, but there are a couple ways to use the echo functionality without actually speaking to (or even owning) an echo.

I do know there is a 3rd party plugin that mimics the echo, so you can speak to it and it will speak back just like an echo does.

For HS3 use, you can also just use HSTouch, either through a touchscreen device, or your mobile phone. This works the same as the standard HomeSeer skill, except you don't need to say "Alexa, tell HomeSeer to" before your command.

[jetkit]

If you're prefer not to add "run the event" to the spoken phrase, then add another trigger to the event with the phrase you want to speak. Then, you say "Alexa, tell HomeSeer to [phrase you want to speak]".

What syntax goes in here? Where is this documented?

If I set the phrase = "Open front door", it works.
If I set the phrase = "Open [the] front door", nothing works.
Log shows the phrase is heard correctly, but adding optional [] makes it to fail no matter what.

And is there a way for HS to tell Alexa a specific response for that event?
So far the only response I get is what was set in voice setup, but then it is too generic.
The Say something command in event goes to a Speaker.exe, not to Alexa

[rjh]

The optional words are used only by the Windows voice recognition they will not work with Alexa.

What syntax goes in here? Where is this documented?

If I set the phrase = "Open front door", it works.
If I set the phrase = "Open [the] front door", nothing works.
Log shows the phrase is heard correctly, but adding optional [] makes it to fail no matter what.

And is there a way for HS to tell Alexa a specific response for that event?
So far the only response I get is what was set in voice setup, but then it is too generic.
The Say something command in event goes to a Speaker.exe, not to Alexa

[fschwing]

Problem Controlling Garage Doors

I'm having trouble getting my garage door controllers to work with the Echo. The app says that they are discovered, but I cannot control them. Here's an example of what I've tried for one of the doors:

Floor = first floor
Room = garage
device = door one

I've tried a bunch of different phrasings. Here are the commands as heard by Homeseer. In all cases, Alexa says 'that device was not found'.

Info Heard: set the garage door one to close
Info Heard: get the status of garage door one
Info Heard: set the status of garage door one to close
Info Heard: close first floor garage door one
Info Heard: close door one
Info Heard: close garage door one
Info Heard: get the status of garage door one

Using the other Homeseer skill, it works if I say 'Alexa, close door one'. If I say 'Alexa, close garage door one', it says that it cannot find the device.

To add to the confusion, I have a second door called 'door two'. If I say, 'Alexa, close door two', it cannot find the device no matter what I do. This door is set up identical to 'door one'. I thought that maybe 'two' was confusing it, so I tried making it 'door three'. Still no luck.

Any thoughts would be appreciated. Thanks.

[cheeryfool]

I'm having trouble getting my garage door controllers to work with the Echo. The app says that they are discovered, but I cannot control them. Here's an example of what I've tried for one of the doors:

Floor = first floor
Room = garage
device = door one

I've tried a bunch of different phrasings. Here are the commands as heard by Homeseer. In all cases, Alexa says 'that device was not found'.

Info Heard: set the garage door one to close
Info Heard: get the status of garage door one
Info Heard: set the status of garage door one to close
Info Heard: close first floor garage door one
Info Heard: close door one
Info Heard: close garage door one
Info Heard: get the status of garage door one

Using the other Homeseer skill, it works if I say 'Alexa, close door one'. If I say 'Alexa, close garage door one', it says that it cannot find the device.

To add to the confusion, I have a second door called 'door two'. If I say, 'Alexa, close door two', it cannot find the device no matter what I do. This door is set up identical to 'door one'. I thought that maybe 'two' was confusing it, so I tried making it 'door three'. Still no luck.

Any thoughts would be appreciated. Thanks.

Have you tried renaming the devices "garage door one" and "garage door two". Try that then delete them from the Alexa app and rediscover them. No guarantees, but worth a try

[rjh]

Just to confirm, you are using the SmartHome API, so you have enabled the HS SmartHome skill and use the "Discover My Devices" command to find your devices? If so, the problem is that the Alexa SmartHome skill is doing the work to recognize your commands. Its vocabulary is limited to lighting and thermostats. So attempting to control other types of devices, like a garage, may fail as that is not a lighting device.

If you are using our SmartHome skill, where you say "Alexa, tell homeseer to open the garage door", that should work ok, and if it is not, let me know.

I'm having trouble getting my garage door controllers to work with the Echo. The app says that they are discovered, but I cannot control them. Here's an example of what I've tried for one of the doors:

Floor = first floor
Room = garage
device = door one

I've tried a bunch of different phrasings. Here are the commands as heard by Homeseer. In all cases, Alexa says 'that device was not found'.

Info Heard: set the garage door one to close
Info Heard: get the status of garage door one
Info Heard: set the status of garage door one to close
Info Heard: close first floor garage door one
Info Heard: close door one
Info Heard: close garage door one
Info Heard: get the status of garage door one

Using the other Homeseer skill, it works if I say 'Alexa, close door one'. If I say 'Alexa, close garage door one', it says that it cannot find the device.

To add to the confusion, I have a second door called 'door two'. If I say, 'Alexa, close door two', it cannot find the device no matter what I do. This door is set up identical to 'door one'. I thought that maybe 'two' was confusing it, so I tried making it 'door three'. Still no luck.

Any thoughts would be appreciated. Thanks.

[srodgers]

So attempting to control other types of devices, like a garage, may fail as that is not a lighting device.

Rich I use Alexa Smart home skill and control other HS devices. I can control ElkM1g task via Ultra's plugin with
Alexa Smarthome skill.

Alexa seems to be able to control most HS devices as long as they present themselves as On/Off devices and have voice control enabled.

If OP sets up device and can live with using Turn On Garage Door and Turn Off Garage Door it should work.

Wish they would expand the action verb sets to allow some flexibility. Open/Close, Up/Down, Run/Stop etc would make things a while lot easier and more natural. Understand the HS skill allows this but a change to HS and the Smarthome skill can do this.

If you could translate these action sets back to simple ON/Off commands for Alexa the the Smarthome skill would be better.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[DESIi1]

NuTone Garage Door Controller

I have the NuTone controller, Alexa responds to "Alexa, turn on Garage 1" (or 2) and opens the door.

Alexa responds to "open" and "close" commands with "I'm not quite sure how to help you with that"

Is there as easy way to get "open" and "close" to be recognized?

Has the gentleman below tried to use turn on/turn off?

[rjh]

Sounds like you are asking me to convert Open to ON and Close to Off, and such? Not sure how the user would know what to say if I did that. The commands would still be odd, like "turn on the garage door".

You can create virtual devices in HS and then add your own ON/OFF commands, then link that virtual device to the real device (using the new linking functionality), then you can use the Alexa compatible commands.

Rich I use Alexa Smart home skill and control other HS devices. I can control ElkM1g task via Ultra's plugin with
Alexa Smarthome skill.

Alexa seems to be able to control most HS devices as long as they present themselves as On/Off devices and have voice control enabled.

If OP sets up device and can live with using Turn On Garage Door and Turn Off Garage Door it should work.

Wish they would expand the action verb sets to allow some flexibility. Open/Close, Up/Down, Run/Stop etc would make things a while lot easier and more natural. Understand the HS skill allows this but a change to HS and the Smarthome skill can do this.

If you could translate these action sets back to simple ON/Off commands for Alexa the the Smarthome skill would be better.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[rjh]

See my post:

https://forums.homeseer.com/showpost...3&postcount=99

You can create virtual devices to do what you want. Might be a lot of work if you have many things you want to control with your voice, but I suspect most users just have a small subset of devices that they want to voice enabled, so its not bad. You can create one virtual device with the on/off commands, then just copy it for other devices.

Disable the voice command on the original device to limit what Alexa discovers.

I have the NuTone controller, Alexa responds to "Alexa, turn on Garage 1" (or 2) and opens the door.

Alexa responds to "open" and "close" commands with "I'm not quite sure how to help you with that"

Is there as easy way to get "open" and "close" to be recognized?

Has the gentleman below tried to use turn on/turn off?

[Guest]

I use the Iphone app called 'Reverb' to talk to my Echo. It doesn't require saying "Alexa" first.

[DESIi1]

Alexa has learned to respond to "Open"

See my post:

https://forums.homeseer.com/showpost...3&postcount=99

You can create virtual devices to do what you want. Might be a lot of work if you have many things you want to control with your voice, but I suspect most users just have a small subset of devices that they want to voice enabled, so its not bad. You can create one virtual device with the on/off commands, then just copy it for other devices.

Disable the voice command on the original device to limit what Alexa discovers.

Alexa has learned how to respond to "Open". "Open Garage Door 1" now works the same as "Turn on Garage Door 1" No "Tell Homeseer" is needed.

[alphatech]

I created a virtual device called Garage Door, in the status I changed from off to Close and Open to On leaving the control use alone to off and on.
Alexa only understands when I say Alexa, garage door off or on, what am I doing wrong? As of curiosity, at the beginning of Alexa implementation I was able to say Alexa open garage door but that went away and did not work anymore, what changed?

Thanks,
Aldo

See my post:

https://forums.homeseer.com/showpost...3&postcount=99

You can create virtual devices to do what you want. Might be a lot of work if you have many things you want to control with your voice, but I suspect most users just have a small subset of devices that they want to voice enabled, so its not bad. You can create one virtual device with the on/off commands, then just copy it for other devices.

Disable the voice command on the original device to limit what Alexa discovers.

[DESIi1]

open garage door 1

I created a virtual device called Garage Door, in the status I changed from off to Close and Open to On leaving the control use alone to off and on.
Alexa only understands when I say Alexa, garage door off or on, what am I doing wrong? As of curiosity, at the beginning of Alexa implementation I was able to say Alexa open garage door but that went away and did not work anymore, what changed?

Thanks,
Aldo

What is different from my working "open garage door 1" is that it is the actual device, not virtual. But I also have a mystery. "Open garage door 2" does not work with all else the same. I have to use turn on and off. Have not had time to resolve the difference.

[DJF3]

Tip: use linked devices

Hi,

My Homeseer device naming is quite complex but it helps me to keep track of everything. That's not good when using Alexa..

Example: "N3 binary switch 1 - Garden"

TIP

1. Create a new device called "garden" or "garden lamp"
2. (optional) put it in a location1 or location2 called "Alexa"
3. Enable Voice for this device
4. Set the linked device to "N3 binary switch 1 - Garden"
5. Save device

Now I can leave my existing devices the way they are and use new devices with simple names for Alexa. I have not extensively tested this but it seems to work fine.