Michel Kohanim

Hi Ryan0751, Please check the pattern of lights on the front of the unit: http://wiki.universal-devices.com/index.php?title=Troubleshooting_Help#Front_Panel_LEDs.2FLights With kind regards, Michel

Hello all, 1. stusviews problem: if you have two portal modules installed, ISY will deactivate one. That was the issue 2. Digger, Benoit is working with us on the portal and Echo and can be considered part of the team. This is not a third party solution. We own everything 3. We have submitted our app for Connected Home certification but have not heard back 4. We are still waiting for Amazon to get back to us ... I'll send them another email 5. As it is currently, I would say that the whole solution is only usable for simple things. I am thinking that we should forego downloading all nodes/spoken and make a clean interface whereby only most important nodes/programs are downloaded As Benoit suggested, the feedback has been fantastic and quite invaluable. Please do continue posting your experiences and bugs. So, THANK YOU. With kind regards, Michel

Hi Jim, I am not sure how you got the impression that this is a production ready solution. It's not and we never claimed it to be (otherwise it would have been advertised all over the place). Furthermore - and explicitly - I stated that there are some issues and that you are welcome to "test": http://forum.universal-devices.com/topic/17082-interface-with-amazon-echo/?p=157836 Hi whywork, Yes, scenes should work. The issue is with the words used such as bedroom and light. We are definitely working on improvements. IFTTT is not using a skill otherwise you would have to have: "Alexa, tell IFTTTT to trigger xxx". The issue is with Skills and slots that may have other meanings to Alexa. Personally, I think the concept of skills and predefined slots is not going to work for automation because there's really no way to have all different permutations and combinations of locations predefined. We are waiting to hear back from Amazon and hopefully we can figure out a way to make this a little less stringent. In the meantime, Benoit has been playing with utterances and interpretations by Alexa but with very little improvements: Alexa needs a list of words/phrases from which it can infer what was said based on some weights for each. With kind regards, Michel

Hi stusviews, The log you sent me was from 4.2.22 with last entry of January 2015. Have you downgraded? Please note that you need 4.3.x for Portal to work. With kind regards, Michel

Hi stusviews, Please go to Admin Console | Configuration | Portal and make sure it's still registered. Once that's done, please check your error log for any connectivity issues. If you wish, you can send your error log to support@universal-devices.com. With kind regards, Michel

Hi Randy, Sincere apologies. While fixing MobiLinc, we had a regression. Please try again. With kind regards, Michel

Hi barrygordon, I just renamed it for you. With kind regards, Michel

Hi stusviews, Please do the following: 1. Open Echo app (http://echo.amazon.com) 2. Ask Alexa something and make sure it understands it in the card (under Home) 3. Make sure your sentences are structured as follows: Alexa, ask (or tell) izzy TO switch on Please note that both izzy and TO are very important. Once that's done, please do let us know what you said and what Alexa thought you said. With kind regards, Michel

Hi benbennett , Thanks so very much for invaluable feedback. We heard back from Amazon ( I am still very impressed ). In addition to the input from Amazon, we worked with a customer whose echo didn't work with anything. In summation: 1. There's definitely a bug with Alexa whereby the utterance is considered as a Connected Home command. Every time you hear "... not found in ... profile", then the answer is coming from Connected Home not ISY's skill. To address this, Amazon recommended to use "switch on/off" instead of "turn on/off" which is used by Connected Home 2. When you use a Skill, you MUST use "ask/tell izzy TO " ... if Echo does not hear the "to" pronounced correctly, then it'll invoke Connected Home 3. Light(s) might have problems for the same reason as above 4. Alexa uses utterances for a good match and, if not found, then uses literal ... unfortunately we cannot add more utterances to the list because we can never come up with all the combination and permutations of all utterances. Furthermore, we cannot add more utterances since Amazon portal hangs above 170. So, what we are going to do is to fine tune these utterances to maximize understanding. This said, if we change anything, we will have to go back for certification Thanks so very much for your patience! With kind regards, Michel​

Hi 502ss, Thanks so very much for the invaluable feedback. We do know that Alexa has a very hard time with 3 words. This said, the main concern is with things such as "kitchen room". We are working through these as we speak to figure out the algorithm used by Alexa and what's being sent to us. Thank you all for your patience while we figure things out. With kind regards, Michel

Chuck, At this juncture I am not sure what algorithm they use. This said, we are trying to reverse engineer and figure out the root cause. At the moment, our hypothesis is that we have so many utterances (about 170) that Amazon probably times out before calling us. We were going to add more but their tool hangs with anything above 170. From my perspective, if Amazon has to depend on exact match, then it's pretty much useless. This said, I do not want to draw any conclusions till we have further proof. Connected Home: just submitted our application. NAC has to get back to us with cost and time. With kind regards, Michel

Hi bguzik, Thanks SO very much for your kind words. It means a lot to us. I am sure we'll find a solution and hopefully Amazon will help us along the way (they have been very good thus far). With kind regards, Michel

Hi bguzik, Yes, it should. We are working on a few anomalies and most point to the fact that Skills (unlike connected home) require predetermined utterances and, we have reached a limit on Amazon side. So, it seems that even though Alexa hears the correct utterance it has a hard time matching it with the skill's slot (these are all on Amazon side). In the meantime, please do make sure you do: Alexa tell izzy to refresh devices (after every change to your topology/spoken/names) With kind regards, Michel

Hi Elam, ISY Portal is now open to everyone. The reason we have not yet advertised the Skill is because there are some anomalies that we are trying to resolve. With kind regards, Michel

Hi David, Thank YOU and I am so very glad to hear that ISY has been productive for you and your loved ones. Yes, we are in contact with SmartHome and they have promised to get this to us ASAP. With kind regards, Michel

Hello everyone, Thanks so very much for all the feedback. We have contacted Alexa team and debugging. Stusviews, if nothing at all works for you, please send your topology to support@universal-devices.com. With kind regards, Michel

Hello everyone, Our skill was certified just a couple of hours ago! This said, we have been testing it and the voice recognition is not that good. Trying to figure out whether or not the issue is on the portal, the skill, or voice recognition. You are all welcome to test the Skill. Again, this is just for the skill and not the Connected Home. To test: 1. Enable ISY Skill in your app and associated it with your portal account 2. Say: Alexa ask izzy to refresh devices (this will bring in all devices into the skill) 3. Ask izzy to do For help: 1. Alexa open izzy 2. The prompts will help you Rather disappointing. With kind regards, Michel

mwester, The last paragraph is correct. With kind regards, Michel

Hi barrygordon, Skill certification is mutually exclusive with Connected Home. So we may have the skill certified and working while waiting for NAC. With kind regards, Michel

Hello everyone, We have been in contact with SmartHome and it seems that they don't have the APIs available nor do they know when it would become available. With kind regards, Michel

Hi smokegrub, If you keep getting the authentication dialog, it means that ISY cannot publish events (and specifically heartbeat) to the Admin Console. This can only happen when ISY cannot find the Admin Console on the network. The major causes are firewall software (which you don't have) or network connectivity. You may want to try https instead of http. If that works, then MAC security is blocking publication of events from ISY to your computer. With kind regards, Michel

Hi blueman2, This means: 1. Once the skill is certified, you can use the skill (Alexa tell Izzy to x) 2. Have to wait for certification from NAC for the connected home which allows you to do simple things without invoking Izzy Not much else. Quite disappointing. With kind regards, Michel​

Hi smokegrub, This is most probably due to firewall issues: http://wiki.universal-devices.com/index.php?title=ISY-99i/ISY-26_INSTEON:Configuring_a_Firewall_for_Your_ISY ​ With kind regards, Michel

Hello everyone, Amazon has changed the Connected Home certification process (not the Skill) and most probably have changed how you communicate with Echo. As of right now, they require us to send devices to NAC to do certification! And, it will cost $$$. A little disappointing but I guess it was inevitable. On the skill side, we are almost there! With kind regards, Michel

Hi KMan, Thanks SO very much! With kind regards, Michel