Starter Template for Alexa Development Environment based on alexa-app

An AWS Lambda template for building Alexa Skills. This template provides the shell that can be used to set up a working Alexa Skill on AWS and the Amazon Echo.

Development with this starter template is best done using alexa-app-root, an alexa-app-server derivation that offers a UI/webpage specifically designed for testing and development.

Setup

This skill will run locally to support development and testing. When ready to push the code to AWS Lambda to test as an actual Alexa skill, AWS Lambda needs to be configured and code pushed to it, and then the Alexa Skill needs to be set up. Prior to the following steps, you will need to set up an AWS Developer account and get set up on the AWS Free Tier to enable development, testing, and hosting for free for 12 months.

After successful sign-up of an AWS account, perform the following setups.

AWS Template Installation

1. Clone (or fork) using git clone git://github.com/rickwargo/alexa-app-template.git my-alexa-skill.
2. cd my-alexa-skill
3. npm install
4. gulp lint
5. gulp test
6. edit config
7. develop app
8. gulp build
9. gulp push

AWS Lambda Setup

You can view one of the many tutorials (e.g., Creating an AWS Lambda Function for a Custom Skill) on adding a function to Lambda or use the gulp task: gulp push-lambda. This task will create or update the function with the defaults specified in aws-config.js.

Alexa Skill Setup

1. Go to the Alexa Console and click Get Started under Alexa Skills Kit and then click the Add a New Skill button in the top right.
2. Set the name of the new skill name and an appropriate invocation name - this is what is used to activate your skill.
3. Optionally, set the version number of the skill, I recommend a 3-part version such as 1.0.0.
4. Select Lambda ARN (Amazon Resource Name) for the Endpoint and paste the ARN copied from the above step. Click Next.
5. Copy the Intent Schema from assets/speech/IntentSchema.json. This file was created from source during the gulp build step above.
6. Create the Custom Slot Types (if any) using the information from assets/speech/CustomSlotTypes.txt. This file was created from source during the gulp build step above.
7. Copy the Sample Utterances from assets/speech/SampleUtterances.txt. This file was created from source during the gulp build step above. Click Next.

Source Setup

1. Go back to the Skill Information tab and copy the Application Id. Paste the Application Id into package.json and config/aws-config.js.
2. Add the AWS Function Name to config/aws-config.js.
3. If the timeout is changed from the default of 3, adjust the setting in config/aws-config.js.
4. Fill out the Description tab. You can use icons in images folder as a start but copy with your own icons.

Prepare for Testing on Echo

1. Update the lambda source zip file with this change by using gulp build and upload to lambda again. You can also use gulp push-lambda-code to build the zip file and upload it to AWS Lambda. This assumes your information has been stored in the environment or in the ~/.aws/credentials file.
2. You are now able to start testing your sample skill on the Amazon Echo! You should be able to go to the Echo webpage and see your skill enabled.
3. In order to test it, try to say some of the Sample Utterances you created.
4. Your skill is now saved and once you are finished testing you can continue to publish your skill. Make sure to pay close attention to the information in Submitting an Alexa Skill for Certification, especially the Submission Checklist.
5. At some point prior to Submitting for Certification, you will need to complete the information on the Publishing Information tab. This can be done now and saved.

Notes

config/lambda-config.js

Debugging

Startup

• If there is no response, check the application Id is set up correctly.

Gulp Tasks

This template supports the following development practices through gulp:

Available tasks	Description
build-assets	Build assets for updating Alexa Skill Model ** Aliases: assets
build-custom-slot-types	Build the custom slot types from source ** Aliases: slots
build-intent-schema	Build the intent schema from source ** Aliases: intent, intents
build-lambda-code	Process source and create dist.zip file to upload to AWS lambda ** Aliases: build
build-utterances	Build the utterances from source ** Aliases: utterances
build-zip	Process source and create zip file
clean	Clean out the dist folder and remove the compiled zip file
config	Compile/move config files to dist
create-zip-file	Zip the dist directory ** Aliases: zip
gather-node-mods	Install npm packages to dist, ignoring devDependencies
default	[help]
help	Display this help text.
lint	Lints all server side js
make-dist	Compile/move javascript files to dist
node-mods	Install npm packages to dist, ignoring devDependencies
push-lambda-code	Process source then upload to AWS lambda ** Aliases: push
quick-build-zip	Process source and create zip file (without rebuilding node modules)
quick-push-lambda-code	Process source then upload to AWS lambda without updating modules ** Aliases: quick, quick-push
rm-dist-package	Removes unnecessary package.json from dist so it does not go to AWS Lambda
super-quick-push-lambda-code	Process source then upload to AWS Lambda without updating modules
test-mock	Run unit tests against AWS lambda ** Aliases: test
test-local	Run unit tests against local server
test-lambda	Run unit tests against AWS lambda
test-and-cover	Run unit tests against local server and run coverage tool ** Aliases: cover
upload	Upload zip file to lambda
vendor	Compile/move vendor files to dist
watch	[watch-lint, watch-test]
watch-lint	Watch for changed files and run lint of the file that has changed
watch-test	Watch for changed files and run unit tests when a file changes
zip	Zip the dist directory