Listen to alexa from nodered

General
1

Hello

I am looking at integrating some devices into Amazon Alexa. For example if device X turns on, it will communicate to Alexa.

However is there a way for Alexa to securely push this notification so that it is available in node-red, without node-red having to ping Alexa for status? There's lots of info online about node-red pushing commands to Alexa.

Just wondering if someone can point me to some further reading.

2

Ther are some examples in this topic Pure fun with Alexa and Alexa Skills the most reliable is to set up virtual devices.

3

Thanks for that. I’ll take a read through the large thread. Is all of this based on having an Alexa hub though? Like an echo? I don’t have an echo, I just have a bunch of devices that can communicate with Alexa. So was wondering if they could communicate directly with Alexa cloud then I could revert those notices to nodered from cloud

4

I think your option are limited to vitual devices , you can set up routines in alexa for those alexa enabled devices and get them to send a diming level to node-red, you could then use that dimming level to determine what the notice should be.
e,g, dimming level 1 of virtual device 1, means notification 1 form alexa device 1.
I have not read of any other method, but there maybe, I am just not aware of any.

5

You will be limited without a hub but you can still get notifications on the phone where you have the Alexa app.

6

I set this up. All is running in node-red. Ended up using the applestrudel fork (node-red-contrib-alexa-remote2-applestrudel (node) - Node-RED)

I have setup a remote event node and I have my device setup in my Amazon Alexa app on my iphone. However, when I trigger the device in the Alexa app, I get nothing on the remote event node in node-red? The event node help file says "Listens to Push events. Events must be enabled for this account.". Is this the issue? Does anyone know how to enable these :\

7

Understand your point now, which of course you had acually named in the OP. If you are using only devices paired to Alexa, haven´t really looked at it , but these devices will not push notifications. As soon as you have any devices paired to another manufacturer´s hub or system, these will notify, from Tasmota, MQTT, Sonoff, Hue , Tuya, Smartthings etc. Each has its own palette node and these can be tied in to send notifications to Alexa. This is what I have and I get announcements from the Echo nearest to me, or notifications on the phone if I´m out. Otherwise, as commented above, a partial solution would be to look into virtual devices.

8

I think I can get it all to work using routines and Alexa. The issue I am having now is that I cannot get node-red-contrib-alexa-remote2-applestrudel (node) to pickup on events from my iphone, where the app is installed. I also have Alexa installed on a Windows PC and I can see commands firing into Nodered. I cannot even see my iphone in the routine node device list the in NR.

9

You don´t see this?

Alexa
Alexa567×335 25.1 KB

10

Yep I have it communicating with all devices now. I can also poll the device from NR and get status using the Smarthome query node. However this is limited to 5 mins which is not practical.

I'm trying to work out why when I change the device status, it is not showing up via the Event node. I have even deployed the event node to listen to every possible "command".

The only way I can get an event to fire is to say something from Alexa installed on my PC. If my IOT device changes state I get nothing. Also, if I speak into my ipad or iphone, I get nothing.

I have tried to setup a routine on the ipad Alexa app as @E1cid mentioned and tried multiple outputs upon detection of lock change, but still nothing showing up in NR

11

Afaik, Amazon don't let phones , I'm an android user and mine acts like your iphone, act as full equivalent alexa echo devices.

12

That's interesting. It would still be nice to have this IoT device trigger on the listener function in the contrib.

Otherwise maybe there's a way to create a custom skill in Alexa developer and AWS lambda to communicate to NR via an API. If anyone has done that please let me know lol