[digiltd]

I recently tried adding the kodi skill to Alexa and I am having problems with it working. I followed all the steps from the guide
http://www.howtogeek.com/249336/how-to-c...azon-echo/

I was able to navigate all the way through the guide until step 5. I created a developer account and added the trigger. I entered the name of the skill and completed all the items list on the left (skill information, interaction model, configuration, test, publishing information, and privacy policy). The SSL certification was not listed on my account. I do not know why it is not showing up or how to get it. I believe this is causing my issue. When I ask the device to play [tv show] [season] [episode] it just searches amazon prime video. What am I doing wrong and is the SSL certification page my problem??

Note: I am an amateur so please bare with me.

Thanks!

That guide is very outdated I'm afraid. It is also a bit mashed up, it was originally a guide that deployed to Heroku but has since been changed to use AWS. Though there are fragments of the old guide still there that are not relevant to AWS.

e.g. the step five in the guide you are stuck on says

On the next page, choose “AWS Lambda ARN” for the Endpoint and paste in the ARN

followed by

On the next page, select “My development endpoint is a subdomain of a domain that has a wildcard certificate from a certificate authority”.

The second part was for the old Heroku guide and shouldn't be there.

If using AWS Lambda as your endpoint you do not need to set the SSL as AWS does this for you. You won't even see the tab.

If you have followed the guide fully then I would suggest you either start again or go over each step this time using the official README. Because the old guide is ... well, old and outdated.

[jingai]

When I ask the device to play [tv show] [season] [episode] it just searches amazon prime video.

How exactly are you invoking the skill? What are you saying to Alexa?

Alexa, Play Kodi seinfeld season 1 episode 1

You need to invoke it like you invoke other skills, like, "Alexa, ask Kodi to..." or "Alexa, tell Kodi to...", where Kodi is the name you've given the skill.

Your example would be correctly formatted as:

"Alexa, ask Kodi to play season 1 episode 1 of Seinfeld"

[jingai]

Works fine in the Service Simulator when I type it in. I keep marking the cards with "no" when asked if she did what you expected her to do. I also tried changing the Sample Utterances to "e-ject" and "e. ject" just to see if that made a difference, but still no joy. She always things I am saying "check", does she correctly hear "eject" on your devices?

I can't say what she hears when it doesn't work, because I just get the single beep from the Echo and no associated card. When it does work, she does hear "eject."

Though I am starting question the value in spending any more time to get this particular function working (I don't personally have a disc drive or any discs to put in it). I assume if someone is ejecting a disc they are going to have to physically take it out of the drawer/slot of the PC running Kodi (because you wouldn't leave the disc sticking out). If they are already at the machine, just press the eject button

I don't think there's much else to do, honestly. Even if we did find some kludge to make it work (e.ject, etc), it probably also wouldn't be reliable and likely would change later anyway.

If it's anything like previous similar problems, this will just go away (and probably come back again) at some point. The layer of magic for first-party intents is always changing and Amazon never tells us when they've reserved something.. frankly, they should never do this, but it's the way it is.

[digiltd]

I can't say what she hears when it doesn't work, because I just get the single beep from the Echo and no associated card. When it does work, she does hear "eject."

Doesn't it show all your voice interactions (good and bad) in the Alexa app under Settings > History?

[jingai]

I can't say what she hears when it doesn't work, because I just get the single beep from the Echo and no associated card. When it does work, she does hear "eject."

Doesn't it show all your voice interactions (good and bad) in the Alexa app under Settings > History?

Ah right, keep forgetting about that. She's hearing "jack" here when it doesn't work.

And yeah.. it works if I enunciate strongly.. but it's a little awkward to do so.

Could perhaps get better if we do it a bunch and reward her with "yeses" when she does hear it correctly lol.

[jingai]

Yeah, a few rounds of positive feedback and she's definitely understanding me more reliably. Just something to try.

Put emphasis on the first syllable (EEject) to get her to work at all, then reward her for it. Do this for the variations (cd, dvd, disc, media, bluray, etc) and keep giving positive feedback when it works, and negative when it doesn't (and there's a card on which to do so).

[bill_orange]

When I ask the device to play [tv show] [season] [episode] it just searches amazon prime video.

How exactly are you invoking the skill? What are you saying to Alexa?

Alexa, Play Kodi seinfeld season 1 episode 1

Try: Alexa ask Kodi to play Seinfeld season 1 episode 1

For test, try the simple ones. Try, Alexa ask Kodi to reboot.

Others have reported that a one syllable name for the invocation can be a problem. The more syllables the better. I am using, Alexa, ask kodi media to ............

For the same reason, the writer of the Nest Skill chose Alexa, ask the thermostat to ......... rather than Alexa, ask nest to ......... to the dismay of the tongue twisted.

[jingai]

Try: Alexa ask Kodi to play Seinfeld season 1 episode 1

No, it's:

"Alexa, ask Kodi to play/watch season/series 1 episode 1 of Seinfeld"

Others have reported that a one syllable name for the invocation can be a problem. The more syllables the better. I am using, Alexa, ask kodi media to ............

I also use Kodi as the skill's name. I did have to provide feedback on the cards for a bit so she wouldn't think I'd said "Cody," but after a few rounds of that it works fine.

[bill_orange]

I am an amateur also, so I may not have a definitive answer for you.

I don't remember needing a an SSL certificate. I deployed to the Lambda site which ask me for an ARN number, but no certificates. Are you using Amazon Lambda to host?

Perhaps a screenshot would help.

On the guide it said there would be a tab on the left for SSL number

[img]https://www.dropbox.com/s/t8ayh3u1qbu4kzo/Untitled.png?dl=0

The screen you posted (dropbox worked just fine) looks just like mine. No problem there if you are using the Lambda site for hosting. As I mentioned in another response to you, others have said that a simple invocation name like "cody" can be a problem. I went with "kodi media". I considered "living room kodi" to get in more syllables but that seemed a bit much.

[digiltd]

@jingai Cool, just like training a dog

In the interest of science (and because this stuff fascinates me) I used Ivona to see how the US and UK pronunciation compares. You can see how for me she was hearing "check" and you "jack"

https://clyp.it/5jyn1w2g

[jingai]

@digiltd, to be totally honest, when I first saw the feedback buttons on the cards, I totally assumed they'd just go into a blackhole. But it really does seem to have an immediate impact.

I wonder if the feedback buttons help other users too? That is, if I go through a few rounds of feedback to correct her, do you all benefit too? Would be nice to know.

[bill_orange]

I could not get a card on Eject at all. My wife ,however, could get a response about 25% of the time. I started providing feedback on my wife's utterances and now my speaking of Ejectt works about 60% of the time. Yes, the change seems instantaneous.

[digiltd]

@digiltd, to be totally honest, when I first saw the feedback buttons on the cards, I totally assumed they'd just go into a blackhole. But it really does seem to have an immediate impact.

I wonder if the feedback buttons help other users too? That is, if I go through a few rounds of feedback to correct her, do you all benefit too? Would be nice to know.

I think it only relates to the account used, because you lose any learning if you delete the saved recordings. But saying that who knows what Amazon do with the data.

[mreedy]

How exactly are you invoking the skill? What are you saying to Alexa?

Alexa, Play Kodi seinfeld season 1 episode 1

You need to invoke it like you invoke other skills, like, "Alexa, ask Kodi to..." or "Alexa, tell Kodi to...", where Kodi is the name you've given the skill.

Your example would be correctly formatted as:

"Alexa, ask Kodi to play season 1 episode 1 of Seinfeld"

I tried the suggested format for Alexa and multiple others; none seem to work. Alexa did ask me a few options one time of "play Kodi Season 1 Episode 1 Seinfeld" but it just went to Amazon Prime content after I selected the option. It seems like the skill is working but it is not triggering Kodi to play. Any suggestions?

[jingai]

"play Kodi Season 1 Episode 1 Seinfeld" is not at all how you invoke this skill.

Please try this exactly and post exactly the results you get:

"Alexa, ask Kodi to watch season 1 episode 1 of Seinfeld"