This talk specially focuses on giving a head start about building and using applications in python for use with an Alexa device.

1. Alexa Enabled
Smart Home Programming
with Python
Sonal Raj PyCon India 2018
Hyderabad, IN

2. Hello!
I am Sonal Raj
2 year old Alexa user. 10 year old Pythonista.
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3. IOT Internet of Things

4. 4

5. Woah!!
5
Total Adult
Population
252
MILLION
Smart Device
Owners
47.3
MILLION
Source: Voicebot voice shopping US Consumer Adoption and Attitudes 2018 Report

6. 6

7. 7

8. Source: Voicebot voice shopping US Consumer Adoption and Attitudes 2018 Report
8
Amazon
62%
Google
27%
Apple
4%
Sonos
4%
Others
3%

9. Source: Google
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10. 10
Commands

11. 11
Conversations
Commands

12. 12
Increase the living
room temperature
slightly.
I am feeling cold /
hot
Optimize my room
temperature
How many heaters
are on here
Initiate rapid
cooling mode for
all rooms
Turn off cooling

13. 13
Light Name
On/Off
Color
Brightness
State
Location
Alexa, initiate
night mode in
living room
Interactions

14. Switch the TV
Channel to the
cricket match…
Is the front door
locked …
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Turn on the
sprinklers in the
garden…
Warm up the water
in the shower..
Lower the
temperature..
Turn up the heat in
this room..
Start vacuuming
this room…
Initiate home
lockdown…

15. The Alexa
Framework

16. Skill
16

17. Skill
Service
17
The Service

18. Skill
Interface
18
The Interface
Utterances
SLOT
TYPES
INTENT
SCHEMA

19. Terminologies
Building a Skill

20. 20
“Alexa, ask Zomato for the nearest [restaurantType]”
Invocation Name
Slot
Utterance
Intent
maps to

21. 21
Invocation Name
What a user must say to “start” the skill. Each skill has a
unique Invocation Name

22. 22
“Alexa, ask Zomato for the nearest [restaurantType]”
Invocation Name
Slot
Utterance
Intent
maps to

23. 23
Utterance
A spoken phrase that maps to an intent. A skill can
have many utterances.

24. 24
“Alexa, ask Zomato for the nearest [restaurantType]”
Invocation Name
Slot
Utterance
Intent
maps to

25. 25
Slot
A variable within an utterance. Variable possibilities
must be defined.

26. 26
“Alexa, ask Zomato for the nearest [restaurantType]”
Invocation Name
Slot
Utterance
Intent
maps to

27. 27
Intent
Whenever you speak to an Alexa Skill, your message is
mapped to an intent which decides what code to run
within your skill.

28. 28
“Alexa, ask Zomato for the nearest [restaurantType]”
Invocation Name
Slot
Utterance
Intent
maps to

29. 29
Interface
Service
Interaction Model
Utterances

30. Flask-Ask
A Flask extension that has wrappers for the common constructs
for the Alexa skills API.

31. Flask-Ask
A Flask extension that has wrappers for the common constructs
for the Alexa skills API.
• Has decorators to map Alexa requests and intent slots to
view functions
• Helps construct ask and tell responses, re-prompts and cards
• Makes session management easy
• Allows for the separation of code and speech through Jinja
templates
• Verifies Alexa request signatures

32. [ Developer Experience ]
Let’s see how the code looks like.

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34. 34

35. 35

36. Testing a Skill

37. ngrok
exposes local servers behind NATs and firewalls to the public
internet over secure tunnels.

38. ngrok
Local http to public https!!!
• Demoing web sites without deploying
• Building webhook consumers on your dev machine
• Testing mobile apps connected to your locally running
backend
• Stable addresses for your connected devices that are
deployed in the field
• Running personal cloud services from your home

39. AWS Lambda
AWS Lambda is a compute service that lets you run code without
provisioning or managing servers.

40. AWS Lambda
A compute service that lets you run code without provisioning or
managing servers.
• Executes your code only when needed
• Scales automatically, from a few requests per day to
thousands per second.
• Charged for compute, not downtime
• Any kind of application backend
• build serverless applications composed of functions that are
triggered by events

41. Alexa Skill Test

42. Alexa Simulator
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43. Echosim.io
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44. Deploying a Skill

45. IFTTT

46. 46
The Future
• Interactive Social Networks
• Interactive Idea boards
• Voice Gaming
• Crisis Alerting
• Office Integration – Meeting room bookings, etc.
• Always aware state!! ( Creepy!! )

47. 47
AlexaBot
Source: https://github.com/jacobajit/AlexaBot

48. Thanks!
Questions??
You can find me at:
q sonal.nitjsr@gmail.com
q sonal-raj@github
q _sonalraj@twitter
q sonalr2@facebook
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