bmercier

Good points. That will be fixed. Benoit.

The news are that...We were hoping to get news from Amazon last week, but we didn't. We may be very close to an approval. But with experience, there may very well be more feedback coming from amazon requesting enhancements somewhere. We just don't know yet. Benoit.

That is correct. Benoit.

Please allow me to answer your question. If I understand correctly, you are referring to the Alexa connected home (In the echo app, in Settings/Connected home). Both a skill and a connected home connector are waiting for certification. Also, I'm not sure that I would qualify the connected home connector as superior. This connected home connector, only allows to to turn on/turn off and set a brightness level. It does not offer the level of freedom that is possible with a skill, like lock/unlock doors or set thermostat settings. The only benefit is shorter spoken commands. Benoit.

Unfortunately, it's not possible yet. Every HTTP(S) requests require an authorization headers with basic auth. The maker channel does not allow to specify a user/password. Benoit.

Yes and no. When you issue a complete voice command, it will proceed, give you feedback, and terminate. However, if some information is missing, then it enters conversation mode and asks you for more information, then proceed, give you feedback, and terminate. Here's an example: User: Alexa, ask ISY to change setpoint Alexa: Setpoint for which device? User: second floor Alexa: Setpoint for which mode. Heating or Cooling? User: heating Alexa: What themperature? User: 23 degrees Alexa: second floor heating setpoint is now set to 23 degrees Or you could just say: User: Alexa, tell ISY to set second floor cooling setpoint to 23 degrees Alexa: second floor heating setpoint is now set to 23 degrees NOTE: You may have noticed the "ISY" skill invocation name. Due to certification feedback, we are back to "ISY", but this time spoken as "izzy" (Not I.S.Y.). Benoit.

I can tell you that with the ISY skill, it is far from taking 15 seconds. More in the range of 1-2 seconds at most. Benoit.

Hello, Amazon returned to us again last week with certification results. They had 6 additional points that needed to be fixed/enhanced to pass the certification. They are now completed, and the skill has been submitted for a third round today. Among the changes, we had to change the invocation name to "my home" instead of just "home" Benoit.

@MWareman, cool, so it works through portal then! @Xathros, I looked around in the logs around 11:20 EST and could not find anything unusual.

Hello Xathros, I don't use Mobilinc so I cant' test it myself. If you can provide a date and time, I can investigate the portal logs. Thanks, Benoit.

Hi Robert, Unfortunately, there is no easy way to give access without amazon publishing the skill or the connected home link. Benoit.

I don't think it's possible. I'm not aware of any API allowing this. I have seen hacks where we can have Alexa say something based on an external trigger, but this require to have the Amazon echo remote, and it needs some hardware (like a PI) to generate spoken sentences through the remote. At this point, if you have hardware that speaks, you don't need the echo. You need an amp + speakers. Benoit.

Dimming ISY devices is supported on the Connected home API (And also the skill). In regards to programs, I have struggled to find a natural way of launching programs. All I could come up with is: Alexa, tell home to run ... Alexa, tell home to execute ... The problem with 'Alexa, Turn the xyz on' is that it can/will be confused with devices. FYI, programs do not have a spoken field associated to them. So, the skill will try to do a match with the program name, Benoit.

That's right, your understanding is correct. Benoit

The skill handles that has well. In regards to thermostats, you can: - Get the temp - Get/Set Mode - Get/Set setpoints for cool or heat - Increase/decrease setpoint for cool or heat Getting setpoints is done either for cool or heat, in 2 different calls. But that could be easily enhanced. Good suggestion. Benoit.

Hi Xathros, Thanks for the into. After some quick read, I found out this page which explains well the inner working I was looking for: http://www.makermusings.com/2015/07/13/amazon-echo-and-home-automation/ Thanks, Benoit.

Just curious, what is the "Echo bridge with the emulator" you are referring to? Benoit.

Absolutely, any device that can be controlled can also be queried. In the case of the temperature, I'm assuming that you are referring to the ambiant temperature of one of your thermostat, so it's yes. Benoit.

Hello Randy, Testing shows that "home" is accepted and speech recognition worked well with it. However, if the certification team tells us for some reason that we have to choose something else, the fallback plan is to use "My home". Benoit.

That should work well. From the Amazon perspective, it's two different devices, unaware of each other. They can be both configured to talk to the same ISY using the same portal account. It's similar to having 2 browsers connected to the same ISY. Benoit.

Hi Xathros, Finally I'm planning to change the token to another format which does not require urlencoding. The hash will be converted to hex string instead of base64. The advantage will be that you can use it as is in the networking resource, with or without encoding. The drawback is the url will be longer. For now, I'm holding on further changes while the Amazon certification is taking place. When this is complete, I will proceed with this change. This will unfortunately be disruptive for you, but that will be better in the long run. Thanks, Benoit.

I see what you mean. It's not ideal if you have many like this. I will discuss it with Michel, and see if we can come up to something. Benoit.

Hello, Just a quick update on Alexa skill certification; Amazon returned to us last week with certification results. There were some items that needed to be changed which are now completed. It has been resubmitted for a second round. We took the opportunity to change the invocation name for the skill. Based on feedback and discussions, the invocation name has been changed to "Home", instead of "I.S.Y." Therefore, you will be able to talk to Alexa like this: Alexa, tell home to turn on hallway to 50% Alexa, tell home to lock front door Alexa, ask home for the temperature of second floor thermostat It will be more natural to say things like: "Alexa, tell home to switch ISY to <ISY name>", for those with multiple ISYs registered on UDI portal. Note that in cases like above, based on your feedback, ISY can be pronounced I.S.Y or Izzy. Both are now accepted. Thanks, Benoit.

Do you mean the admin console URL show in the ISY information tool is not valid sometimes? Benoit

Yes and No. The issue is that the hash is in a base64 representation, and the / is a perfectly valid character. So this is why the admin console URL also url encodes it. The alternative I could see is that I could use an hex representation of the hash instead. That would become a longer URL, but at least, it would be valid without the requirement to be url encoded. Or, we could come back to a base url which is url encoded (The first part of the admin console URL). Benoit.