Making voice announcements & controlling Amazon Alexa Echo

#121

I am puzzled. I have set up this piston and simulated contact sensor, alexa sees it open in the app, my piston status says it is true but nothing is getting annouced. Alexa annouces for all my other contact sensors I can’t figure out why it won’t for this one.

#122

What if we have Google Home instead of Alexa? How would we do this for Google Home?

#123

Try this. Go into Alexa app de-authorize SmartThings skill and then re-authorize it again. It’s a known bug.

#124

The concept is still the same for the advanced sections, but even a 30 year old speaker will work beautifully for voice notifications.

#125

Thanks for response. Actually I did a refresh of both the app and my alexa devices and all is well :slight_smile:

#126

I just set this up on another device, and noticed something worth mentioning… There was a 7-10 second lag from the time the notification came in, until the message was spoken. :-1:

If this happens in your setup, the solution is in the Alert/Say command…
(step 6, line 3 above)

As soon as I UNchecked “Continue Task Immediately” it ran nearly instantly!
(it sounds counter-intuitive, but works like a charm!)

My original post has been edited to mention this setting.

#127

I have this issue and it’s bizarre. I’ve not had “Continue Task Immediately” checked at any point.

Very odd, it’s almost as if it’s linked to the Wait command in Line 4.

With regards the mulitple SmartThings apps. I have the same. I only checked the first one and deleted the com.smartthings.android and that got it working. Prior to that Smartthings picked up the notification but there was no playback on my Bose speaker. If I pressed the play symbol at the bottom of the Task Edit screen on Tasker it worked!

Very nice work, now to think of some applications for it!

Rich

#128

I appreciate your input, @Rich_N…

I am at a point where over half of my pistons announces some kind of verbal alert during execution. Adding that single character to any PUSH makes it super easy to tweak any current piston you have!

#129

Hi WCore,

Really well written forum post. Thank you for providing so much detail for us.

WHAT I HAVE:
I have the Fire HD 8 Plus (purchased it last week🙂), I have the Google Play Store that I have downloaded the ST Legacy App, Newer ST App, Fully Kiosk Browser, Google Chrome and AutomateIt (Similar to Tasker).

WHAT I AM TRYING TO ACCOMPLISH:
I am trying to get applications (Ex: SoundCloud, Fitbit, Sonos App, Specific Web Browser) to launch by speech on my Fire HD 8 Tablet Plus.

PROBLEM:
For whatever reason (Similar to another user above), I can only get PUSH notifications to show up on my iPhone not my Fire HD 8 Plus, from either the ST Classic and ST newer application. Notifications are on for both ST applications on my Fire tablet. Because, push notifications are not displaying on my tablet it is preventing AutomateIt from executing it’s task to launch an app on my tablet. (I am receiving push notifications from other Amazon apps ‘Amazon Store’ etc., but not these)

GOOD TO KNOW:
• My default browser is Google Chrome.

• Applications will launch on my tablet when they are manually pressed in AutomateIt.

• My Fire HD 8 Plus is not showing up in either of my ST application under “Things” like my Echo Dot. Is there a way to add it as a thing, could this be why?

• I have an Echo Dot and ‘Alexa Speaks’, but don’t really know how to use ‘Alexa Speaks’ possibly there is a work around with that.

  • I can receive Push Notifications from Amazon Alexa app on my tablet, but can’t seem to physically trigger a Push Notification from it myself. Maybe I am doing something wrong and there is?

I’m going to try to (as silly as this sounds), check if Gmail push notifications work on my Fire tablet or create a SMS number for them to trigger my AutomateIt rules. If you have any other ideas let me know.

Will try Tasker if I can get this to work. Haven’t had a fair share of time with either applications yet.

#130

Not a solution, just an observation. I have several Fire HD pads around my house. I purchased a Fire HD 10 pad (generation 9) recently and I cannot get it to be recognized by ST. I have tried everything. I use Echo Speaks and can easily add my other pads to ST and use webcore for speech automations. But not with the new HD 10 pad. Others in the ST forums have had similar problems, but it does not seem to be widespread.

#131

Amazon tablets run a proprietary (*cough* old & modified) version of all apps.
(IE: If the Google Play version of ST Classic fails, try the Amazon version, or visa versa)

In other words, Tasker will also need notifications to be working on your tablet so it can do it’s job.

#132

You can always hack the pad so it’ll use Google Play. I did that with an old Fire tablet a few years back.

#133

I’ve done that with all of my pads. And my new HD 10 pad shows up in ST. BUT, I cannot get Echo Speaks to recognize the pad (like ALL of my other pads).

#134

@WCmore

Thanks for this great rundown. I’m trying to adapt your process and idea to use Tasker and Autonotification so that if someone rings my NEST Hello doorbell, the AMAZON Echos in my home will announce and/or chime. While I’m sure you know those two devices don’t play nicely together, I feel cautiously optimistic based on your explanation of the use of these two apps that I’d somehow be able to accomplish the following:

  1. Someone rings doorbell;
  2. Dedicated android phone in basement receives notification;
  3. Tasker and/or Autonotification catch that doorbell ring notification (fuzzy on the details here);
  4. Tasker triggers a piston in WebCore (fuzzy on the details here, too) that does one of the following two things:
    (i) uses the “playAnnouncement” function on WebCore to alert me someone is at the door; or
    (ii) flips a virtual switch that triggers an Alexa routine that does the same.

Think this is somehow possible?

#135

The easiest way is IF SmartThings/webCoRE can see the doorbell ring.

If so, here is the basic flow:

  1. Someone rings doorbell
  2. A webCoRE piston catches the event, and
    (i) flips SimSwitch
    (ii) speaks whatever

Alternatively, IF SmartThings/webCoRE can not see the doorbell ring… but
IF Nest sends a notification to your Android, then the flow is something like this:

  1. Someone rings doorbell
  2. Nest sends Notification to Android
  3. Tasker sees this specific notification, and executes a piston
  4. The piston does all the fancy footwork:
    (i) flips SimSwitch
    (ii) speaks whatever

Both scenarios are very different from this thread though, so which ever path you choose, please start a new thread, and I will try to assist you there.

#136

For those subscribed to this thread, I have added a new post to the top that has a nice summary of this entire thread…

#137

Well, it is official… As of Sept 8, 2020:

<quote>
“The Echo Speaks SmartApp will no longer be supported and existing installs will no longer be accessible”
</quote>

Thankfully, everything here in the top post will continue to work!!

pic

(So if you want advanced voice alerts, you all have 4 weeks to make the switch)

Announcement - Changes to Legacy SmartThings Platform
#138

Hopefully SmartThings will learn something with this debacle and give other authors more than 3 1/2 weeks notice that their SmartApp is being singled out and disabled across the platform!

Given all it can do, I wouldn’t be surprised if Webcore is probably the next most expensive SmartApp on their platform after Echo Speaks. I’m worried!

#139

I agree, 28 days is not enough, but to be honest, we’ve known all year that groovy based code was going away.

Personally, I am disappointed that they want to pull the plug (on anyone) before having a solid infrastructure in place in the new ecosystem.

Perhaps this is a good analogy:
Under normal circumstances, I would never rent or load a moving truck until AFTER my new house is 100% ready to be moved in to. (If I break that rule, then either I am an idiot, or my current landlord is a jerk, and I have no other choice)

The good news is, everything in my top post here will continue to work for years in the future.

#140

If only there was a similar iOS solution. sigh