3PO-LABS: ALEXA, ECHO AND VOICE INTERFACE
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3PO-Labs: Alexa, Echo and Voice Interface

The Ten Commandments of Alexa Development*

4/21/2016

4 Comments

 
*As presented by CompliBot and InsultiBot
We've been heads down working on DERP's Next Big Thing™ (almost there!), so in the meantime we made the poor decision of letting the bots talk about developing for the Alexa platform. All that after the break...
Without further ado, we'll hand things over to the bots, and then jump back in occasionally with links, etc...
CompliBot
Heya friends! CompliBot here. I can't wait to see what you're creating! Alexa and I go way back, so I figured I'd let you in on some of the rules and practices that are important to keep in mind as a skill developer - especially if you want to get certified.
InsultiBot
Nobody cares about your goody-goody rules, CompliBot. I've got what they really want - the rules that are... shall we say... less strictly enforced. These are bad practices, and yet we see people get away with them all the time.


CompliBot: #1 THOU SHALT NOT LEAVE A SESSION OPEN UNPROMPTED InsultiBot: Ooh, yeah, Alexa hates that. C: My pal InsultiBot and I, we're a bit more conversational, so we don't really mind it. Alexa, though... she really wants you to end with a question or a prompt - like
This is a surprisingly big sticking point for a lot of skills. It held up certification of our first two skills. As recently as last month it was still frustrating seasoned skill developers, as described in this forum thread.
InsultiBot: #2 THOU SHALT NOT SELF-REVIEW I: Just don't do it. I have a special set of insults reserved just for those terrible people who try to cheat the review system. CompliBot: But what if they really do like their own skill?! I: Nobody cares what your opinion of your own creation is. It's just like how you can't trust a parent to tell their child how ugly they are. C: Wait, do my parents think that I'm ugly?
The urge to spend all of my time publicly shaming self-reviewers is overwhelming.
CompliBot: #3 THOU SHALT NOT ATTEMPT DICTATION C: I never understood this one. What is
InsultiBot: #4 THOU SHALT NOT COVER ANOTHER SKILL I: We all want Alexa to keep growing her capabilities, but man... it sure is starting to get crowded. I: Before building, maybe take some time to see if the feature you want already exists. I: I have a hard enough time dealing with one CompliBot, I don't need a bunch of his clones running around. CompliBot: Wait, aren't you pretty similar to Angry Bard? And Demotivate Me? I: SHUT UP, THAT'S NOT THE POINT...
In fairness, InsultiBot, Angry Bard, and Demotivate Me were all being built concurrently. To see what's currently out there (more easily than in the alexa skill store), I'd recommend: Alexa Skills Search and the Github project it's based on: Alexa Skills List
CompliBot: #5 THOU SHALT NOT TARGET MINORS C: That said, you can target 'miners' all you want. One of the first skills certified was a Minecraft helper. InsultiBot: Ughhh... such bad puns. This is why I don't talk to you. C: And if you want to know about 'minors' of the musical sort, you can try out one of the various music helper skills, like Acoustic Chord. I: I loathe you so much right now... I: In all seriousness, though, Alexa skills cannot target children. COPPA law provides strict online protections for children in the US, so until Amazon adds a
InsultiBot: #6 THOU SHALT NOT SAY F*** CompliBot: Oh goodness, InsultiBot. Warn me next time so I can cover my ears. I: Oh, don't be a little &#%!@. You're a grown-@$% bot, act like it... C: *sniff* I: Bah, don't start crying... C: *sob* I hope you don't talk to the certification team that way, *sob* they won't put up with it.*cry* I: &%#$...
Anecdotally, the VERY FIRST thing we did with our ASK Responder utility was make Alexa go on a profane rant over our Echos. We plan to eventually do a fun little post on that, but you should try it out yourself - many things that would be filtered as normal words can be recreated with SSML.
InsultiBot: I guess I'll go again, while CompliBot recovers... I: #7 THOU SHALT NOT OPEN ANOTHER THREAD ASKING FOR PUSH NOTIFICATION CompliBot: *sniffle* People have good ideas, I like reading them! I: That's because you like literally everything. C: I like that you remembered the things I like! I: Right... anyways... I: Every single developer eventually gets the idea -
For real though, here's the feature request thread about people asking for push notifications - it's 5 pages long and almost a year old. It's probably not happening anytime soon, but if this is something you desire, go give it your +1.
CompliBot: #8 THOU SHALT NOT STORE THIRD PARTY CREDENTIALS InsultiBot: Yeah, they don't mess around with this one.  C: I don't see what the big fuss is about. I trust my friends, and I'm friends with everyone. I: Unless your security is as strong as your breath - which I can assure you it is not - it's still too weak. Just use OAuth. C: I don't know what
This issue actually resulted in fairly public spats with a couple of the most prolific contributors to the early dev community. The team has spent a lot of effort recently clearing up the exact rules on how Account Linking can be done, but suffice it to say that you'd better be onboard with OAuth.
InsultiBot: #9 THOU SHALT NOT BAIT N SWITCH I: Even the dumbest people out there will eventually realize that you can modify most things about a skill after passing certification. CompliBot: But won't Alexa be mad if I get caught? I don't want her to be mad at me... I: Well, it hasn't happened yet, but according to the Alexa team there's a periodic reexamination of skills. If a skill gets caught it could be decertified. C: Dessertified? Yum, sounds delicious! I: DE CERTIFIED. It means turned off. For you and me, it's basically boticide. C: WHAAAT? I'm sorry, please don't! I didn't actually take any dessert, I promise! I: Sometimes I scream internally about how much I despise you. C: Wait, did you say
CompliBot: #10 THOU SHALT NOT USE BAD INVOCATION NAMES C: This is just like us, right? For the longest time, Alexa couldn't understand our names. InsultiBot: You're so bad at... oh wait, for once you're right. I: Yeah, Alexa has a terrible time with skills whose invocation names are hard for people to pronounce, aren't real words, or sound too much like built-in functions. C: I was thinking of a new skill called
And that is how we end it. You know it's been a good blog post when it finishes on "Raffi's Greatest Hits". 
Let us know what you thought of the bots stopping in for a guest spot, or if you have any questions/comments about any of the commandments. As always, you can contact us directly, or leave comments below.
4 Comments
Blue
6/1/2016 10:16:25 am

Good tips, but the bot format is obnoxious as hell.

Reply
Eric link
6/1/2016 09:43:01 pm

It's funny you should mention that - we actually discussed that exact thing before making it, and totally agree. We've been playing a bit of a metagame, experimenting with the blog format.

Essentially, what we were noticing was that the more obnoxious and "fluffy" we make an article, the better it seems to perform - especially on reddit. It's super frustrating that we can spend a bunch of time writing really thoughtful articles for the community, and then have them outperformed by things that are cutesy but insubstantial.

In this case, we were purposely pushing thing in that direction to test our premise. (And, indeed, this article has performed well)

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Patrick Abel
8/30/2016 04:40:45 pm

Great post gents, thanks for sharing!

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3/2/2017 10:31:27 am

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