Hello All, My Arduino Cloud Thing is based on a swimming pool Temperature Sensor. Early in development I linked my Alexa account using the Arduino Skill and was able to use Alexa voice inquiry to retrieve the current temperature. For whatever reason, this capability has stopped. I can still see the temperature in the Alexa App, but voice inquiry no longer works. The response I get is "Pool doesn't support that." Is this a user problem, an Alexa quirk, or an Arduino Skill problem? Is there another forum for Arduino Skill?
Somewhat new to the Forum, so please let me know if there is a better place to post. Thanks for any help.
I have three Things. Two share one linked variable. This will allow me to have one ESP8266 with an NTC sensor at the pool heater sending the temperature to the cloud and a second ESP8266 in the Cabana driving an LED display. I would also like to inquire by voice using Alexa.
Thing #1: Pool_Temp_OTA This is that one I'm having difficulty with.
Variable Name: Pool_Temperature
In Sync With: Pool_TemR from Pool Temp Readout
Type: Temperatures Sensor (F)
Declaration: CloudTemperatureSensor pool_Temp;
Variable Permission: Read Only
Variable Update Policy: Periodically Every 10 sec
Thing #2: Pool Temp Readout This one seems to work properly.
Variable Name: Pool_TempR
In Sync With: Pool_Temperature from Pool_Temp_OTA
Type: Temperatures Sensor (F)
Declaration: CloudTemperatureSensor pool_TempR;
Variable Permission: Read & Write (so cloud can write to variable in readout ESP)
Variable Update Policy: On Change
My unrelated thing is a light control ESP32 Development Board that controls some LED lighting. It uses one clouddimmedlight to turn on a WS8212 LED String and control brightness of plain white light. Seven other cloudswitches are used in logic as radio buttons to display different holiday color schemes. Alexa voice commands control this Thing wonderfully.
Early in development, Alexa would report the pool temperature whenever I would query, "Alexa, what is the pool temperature?" Now the response is, "Pool doesn't support that."
Problematic Thing ID is: dcac0c9f-5a79-436b-ae27-affd53d742a8
I double-checked all your configurations and I don't see anything wrong with the thing reported. I also tested the temperature request on my devices with positive results. The only warning I can give you is that when you set a temperature variable such as READ&WRITE, the real configuration obtained is that of a thermostat and not a temperature sensor, therefore the set of commands accepted by Alexa could vary. But this doesn't happen on the thing you reported (it happens on the other thing). I would say that on our side I don't see any issue. It may be some kind of misconfiguration on the Alexa side, could you try deleting and recreating the device on Alexa (manually deleting and then requesting "find my devices" again)? Could you maybe check if there is a conflict in the names or groups assigned on the app?
I too have 3 temperature sensors( I2c) that show up fine in Alexa and dashboard but will not reply to voice request. They are read only. Alexa gives a fact about Hot water and not the hot water temp. Print is still on and can share.
Hello @mirkocurtolo
Again, thanks for your help. Found the problem. It was with Alexa.
She is extremely particular about naming procedures. I have about 52 devices that interact in one way or another with Alexa. The majority of them just do their thing based on clock and calendar and I seldom address them with commands. Others are employed several times a day. One of these is a Pool Cover Pump (smart outlet) and Alexa was intercepting my query for temperature and directing to the pump. As an outlet, "Pool doesn't support that." now makes perfect sense. Simply renaming my temperature device (Arduino Skill) to "Swimming Pool" took care of it and Alexa now responds as desired with my water temperature.
Thanks so much for your assistance. My short experience in the Arduino Community has been filled with assistance and a very rapid and pleasurable learning curve.
Best regards
as @jddent9822 suggested, try to give names that are very distinguishable and do not contain any reference to "temperature" or "hot/cold" in them. Yesterday I named a sensor "temperature" and it was literally impossible to ask Alexa "What's the value of temperature?" or something like that, because the name of the sensor was clashing with other kind of generic utterances that Alexa support for the temperature.
Hello! It sounds like a frustrating situation, especially after having it work smoothly before. The issue could stem from a few different places: sometimes Alexa’s skills can be a bit finicky, and updates to either the Alexa app or the Arduino Skill might have caused the voice command functionality to stop working. It’s also possible there’s a minor configuration issue on the user side.
A good first step would be to unlink and then re-link the Arduino Skill in the Alexa app to see if that resolves the issue. If that doesn’t work, checking with the Arduino community or support might help—they may have encountered similar issues. As a pool builder, I know the importance of having reliable tools to monitor and manage a pool, so I can imagine how vital it is for you to get this working again. Hopefully, a quick fix is all it takes. Good luck!
