Amazon has announced that the Alexa Gadgets Toolkit is now available in all locales where Alexa-enabled devices are sold. Use it to participate in the Lego Mindstorms Voice Challenge.

The Alexa Gadgets SDK was originally announced in September 2017 but it was April 2018 before a beta was available and it was rolled out only to developers in the United States, United Kingdom, Ireland, Germany and Austria. Now developers in Australia, Brazil, Canada, France, India, Italy, Japan, Mexico, New Zealand and Spain also have the opportunity to build Echo companion devices. In the intervening period the Gadgets Skill API has been renamed the Echo Buttons Skill API and the range of Alexa Gadgets - Alexa-connected accessories that interact with compatible Amazon Echo devices over Bluetooth - has expanded.

Now with the Alexa Gadgets Toolkit you can use Custom Interfaces to create interactive two-way communication between your product and its paired Echo device. This example of  a Custom Interface shows of what you can do:

The Gadgets Toolkit also offers Defined Interfaces to build a products that reacts in response to some of Alexa’s capabilities. The current list of available interfaces includes: 

• Wake Word Detection: Respond when the wake word is detected, such as a cuckoo clock that pops its head out whenever a customer says, “Alexa.”
  
  
• Speech: Sync physical movement to Alexa’s text-to-speech, such as a robot that lip syncs as Alexa reads the local weather report in the language of your preference.
  
  
• Time Info & Alerts: Respond to time or when a timer, alarm or reminder has been set or triggered, such as an outdoor gong that chimes when a backyard playtime timer has concluded, or a switch that releases dog food each time an alarm has expired. 
  
• Notifications: React to the notification capabilities of Alexa such as an alert flag that raises when a notification is received by your Echo device, and lowers when all notifications are listened to or cleared. 
  
• Music (Beta): Create visual performances such as a hula dancer figurine that moves while songs are played on a customer’s Echo device.

If you are keen to try out the idea of voice-based experiences there's a contest underway on Hackster.io. The challenge is to build a LEGO MINDSTORMS EV3 creation that connects to and works with compatible Amazon Echo devices through the Alexa Gadgets Toolkit. 

From the promo video it really looks like fun if you like both robotics and creating Alexa skills. Its deadline is December 31st so there's still time to join in with a chance chance to win a share of up to $100,000 in prizes.  

More Information 

Alexa Gadgets

LEGO MINDSTORMS Voice Challenge

Related Articles

Alexa Gadgets SDK For Voice-Enabled Play

We Need To Talk About Alexa 

Learn and Profit From Alexa Skills

Entering The Era Of Voice Power 

Alexa For Developers

The State Of Voice As UI

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