HomeSeer Amazon Echo Skill Approved!

[DevinH]

I took Wade's instructions for setting up your own Skill, applied a little bit of formatting, and created a PDF. It should be attached.

[shill]

I'm having a lot of trouble getting events to run correctly. Sometimes it tells me it can't find the device, and a couple of times it's run a completely wrong event ("alarm on" is requested, "send notification" - the last device in the list - is executed).

What I need now is for Amazon to provide "custom triggers" that we can map to skills & phrases. For example, I want to be able to say "Alexa, good morning" and have it run the HomeSeer "Good Morning" event. I don't want to have to say "Alexa, tell HomeSeer to run the Good Morning event."

It would also be awesome to be able to push speech back to Alexa ("Good morning, Steve. Today, the weather is...") via an event action in HS.

[DeLicious]

I think the closest you're going to get with Good morning right now is either through ifttt (Alexa, trigger good morning) or wait for the lighting api integration to be approved and use a virtual device (Alexa, turn on good morning).

As for pushing speech back, it's simply not available directly through echo. The closest solution I've seen so far is to have a Bluetooth connection to Alexa and have the HS say something over the speaker client.


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[macromark]

Two important developments:

1. We submitted some major changes to our Skill today. If approved, this will substantially change the way it works (for the better). We'll announce the details once that is approved.
2. We're also working with the official lighting API (as Rich has mentioned above). When this is done, you'll be able to have Alexa find your lighting devices and you won't need to use the "..Tell HomeSeer to.. " for lighting devices.

More to come when we have more to tell. In the meantime, don't get too hung up on the way things are working now.

[shill]

Two important developments:

1. We submitted some major changes to our Skill today. If approved, this will substantially change the way it works (for the better). We'll announce the details once that is approved.
2. We're also working with the official lighting API (as Rich has mentioned above). When this is done, you'll be able to have Alexa find your lighting devices and you won't need to use the "..Tell HomeSeer to.. " for lighting devices.

More to come when we have more to tell. In the meantime, don't get too hung up on the way things are working now.

How about the fact that the published way to run an event doesn't work? Or runs the wrong one?

[shill]

I think the closest you're going to get with Good morning right now is either through ifttt (Alexa, trigger good morning) or wait for the lighting api integration to be approved and use a virtual device (Alexa, turn on good morning).

As for pushing speech back, it's simply not available directly through echo. The closest solution I've seen so far is to have a Bluetooth connection to Alexa and have the HS say something over the speaker client.


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Now, if only the speaker client ran on Linux...

[macromark]

How about the fact that the published way to run an event doesn't work? Or runs the wrong one?

Like I said above, we're working on fixing things.

[shill]

Like I said above, we're working on fixing things.

"Changing the way it works" and "fixing things" are different, hence my request for clarification.

[Blade]

This idea looks very cool. I have been putting off getting an Amazon echo but I may have to try it. I also see that people have hacked it to connect it into whole house audio. The remote mic is a nice add-on as well.

I agree that Amazon should allow you to set a default skill so you do not have to say "Alexa, tell Homeseer to turn off all lights". It would be nice to just say "Alexa, turn off all lights"

Hopefully they will allow that.

[mterry63]

I agree that Amazon should allow you to set a default skill so you do not have to say "Alexa, tell Homeseer to turn off all lights". It would be nice to just say "Alexa, turn off all lights"

Hopefully they will allow that.

That's available today with the ha-bridge software and Homeseer. Sounds like when Homeseer's new interface is approved the ha-bridge software won't be needed anymore, but I may keep it just for the Harmony hub integration. It's nice to control my lights and fireplace from my TV remote as well as Alexa.

[macromark]

"Changing the way it works" and "fixing things" are different, hence my request for clarification.

We're changing the way it works to fix it.

[DevinH]

What I need now is for Amazon to provide "custom triggers" that we can map to skills & phrases. For example, I want to be able to say "Alexa, good morning" and have it run the HomeSeer "Good Morning" event. I don't want to have to say "Alexa, tell HomeSeer to run the Good Morning event."

You do get quite a bit more freedom when going through the manual homeseer skill setup process. You still have to utilize the skill name in your requests ('tell homeseer to...' although I use 'tell the house to...'), but after that you can utilize whatever phrasing you want. I even use some different one-off phrases for specific events just because it sounds better.

Alexa, tell the house it's bedtime.
Alexa, tell the house I'm leaving now.

It does take a bit more time and effort to setup the skill manually, but it's not all that difficult. And if you utilize custom slots, that cuts down on the setup time by quite a bit.

[Dr_Crash]

Macromark-

This is great news. I have two echo's sitting here waiting for good use. I'm excited. Thanks for the update.

Chris

[Blade]

I see the Amazon Echo does not come with the remote anymore. Does anyone use the remote at all? I could see it being useful if you were outside on the patio or something

[Steve Q]

HomeSeer Amazon Echo Skill Approved!

I keep the remote on the bed stand. I use it to stop music playing or to adjust the volume. I don't want to disturb my wife by speaking.


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