Alexa Skill - Coventry City (1 Viewer)

[Otis]

Do they give you a list of commands that work?

Yeah. It usually tells you what you can ask and how to ask it.

 

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[Otis]

Right, just checked and the Liverpool and Arsenal ones are official club Alexa skills produced by their teams themselves. So official Liverpool FC and official Arsenal.

Maybe I need to have a word with Dale Evans to see what he thinks.

 

[Otis]

I see Sheffield Weds have a forum one on there, OwlsTalk.

 

[Nick]

I see Sheffield Weds have a forum one on there, OwlsTalk.

Going to have to make one now aren't I?

 

[Otis]

Quite a few quiz ones and trivia ones too. Can get interesting facts about your club.

Not sure Alexa can answer 'Just how shit are we?' questions though

 

[shmmeee]

Right, NewsNow is a non-starter, £75/month to access one RSS feed!

To be fair, you could probably recreate it using the Telegraph, Observer, CovMad and the Trust page.

Are there any hooks on this site Nick? Wondering if you could do the front page post titles.

 

[Otis]

Going to have to make one now aren't I?

Would be great I think.

It's the only forum one I can see to be honest. Most of them are either trivia, fun facts or quiz ones.

 

[Otis]

Right, NewsNow is a non-starter, £75/month to access one RSS feed!

To be fair, you could probably recreate it using the Telegraph, Observer, CovMad and the Trust page.

Are there any hooks on this site Nick? Wondering if you could do the front page post titles.

That would be excellent. Without even getting out my bed I can get the lowdown before the day has even begun.

 

[Nick]

Right, NewsNow is a non-starter, £75/month to access one RSS feed!

To be fair, you could probably recreate it using the Telegraph, Observer, CovMad and the Trust page.

Are there any hooks on this site Nick? Wondering if you could do the front page post titles.

Yes there is rss. When at computer I'll find the links.

I use RSS from news sites to get data into here from those already, and podcasts

 

[shmmeee]

Yes there is rss. When at computer I'll find the links.

I use RSS from news sites to get data into here from those already, and podcasts

I tried the one from the link in the bottom right corner, and edited the URL to be just the CCFC forum, and it loaded the XML in my browser, but when I put it into the Alexa setup page, it tells me it's malformed.

The requirements for the feeds are here: Flash Briefing Skill API Feed Reference | Flash Briefing

Don't know how much control you have over them though.

Edit: this was the feed I was using: http://www.skybluestalk.co.uk/forums/coventry-city-general-chat.7/index.rss

 

[ccfcway]

Yeah. It usually tells you what you can ask and how to ask it.

so its like a wife ?

 

[Otis]

so its like a wife ?

Yeah, but she says nice things to me and never has a headache.

 

[Nick]

I tried the one from the link in the bottom right corner, and edited the URL to be just the CCFC forum, and it loaded the XML in my browser, but when I put it into the Alexa setup page, it tells me it's malformed.

The requirements for the feeds are here: Flash Briefing Skill API Feed Reference | Flash Briefing

Don't know how much control you have over them though.

Edit: this was the feed I was using: http://www.skybluestalk.co.uk/forums/coventry-city-general-chat.7/index.rss

Does it show what isnt valid?

IT looks ok :

Feed Validator Results: http://www.skybluestalk.co.uk/forums/coventry-city-general-chat.7/index.rss

 

[stevefloyd]

Yeah, but she says nice things to me and never has a headache.

So your wifes not all bad like you allude then

 

[shmmeee]

Does it show what isnt valid?

IT looks ok :

Feed Validator Results: http://www.skybluestalk.co.uk/forums/coventry-city-general-chat.7/index.rss

It just says “feed is malformed” and gives that link. I think it expects a certain format. From memory it has to be https and it has to have a “description” tag and no more than 5 items at once. Have a look at that link, I reckon you’d need to set up a custom feed that meets the Flash Briefing requirements.

 

[shmmeee]

My laptop died last night so I stopped working but was thinking of starting with a CCFC quiz skill.

Anyone got any ideas where I could get questions from?

 

[Nick]

I'll have a look to see if it can be limited. Https wouldn't be too hard either

 

[Nick]

My laptop died last night so I stopped working but was thinking of starting with a CCFC quiz skill.

Anyone got any ideas where I could get questions from?

People like Jim Brown may have something.

Another idea may be "on this day". I have a book of them somewhere but a pain to type them all out!

 

[shmmeee]

In case you can’t be arsed to follow the link:

Feed format requirements:

• Provide the format type as a MIME type in HTTP Content-Type header
• Provide between 1 and 5 unique feed items at a time.
  • If more items are provided, Alexa ignores items beyond the first five.
  • Items are presented in order from newest to oldest, based on the date value for the item. Alexa may ignore older items.
  • Each item in the feed should be unique and should not overlap with content in another feed item.
• Each item in a feed should contain an audio item, title and description, or a text item, title and description. For audio items, the text element must be present, but only the audio contents will play to the customer.

For text content items

• Each feed item is currently limited to 4500 characters, and will be truncated if it exceeds this length. The truncation will occur at the nearest full sentence below 4500 characters.
• Should be plain text and not contain special characters such as SSML, HTML or XML tags.
• Should be properly punctuated, short, and easily understood when read aloud. Commas (,) and semicolons ( result in short pauses. Periods (.), question marks (?) and exclamation points (!) result in longer pauses. Avoid using non-standard punctuation as it could cause TTS issues.

RSS text multi-item example
This example contains multiple text items that Alexa reads to the customer and plays an earcon sound between the items. The title and link will display in the Alexa app.

Content-Type: application/rss+xml
...
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>
<rss version="2.0">
<channel>
<ttl>30</ttl>
<item>
<title>Multi Item RSS (TTS)</title>
<link>https://www.amazon.com</link>
<pubDate>2016-05-23T00:00:00.0Z</pubDate>
<description>This channel has multiple TTS RSS items. This is item one.</description>
<guid>urn:uuid:b385254e-dc31-4c4a-afc5-0de97e43923c</guid>
</item>
<item>
<title>Multi Item RSS (TTS)</title>
<link>https://www.amazon.com</link>
<pubDate>2016-05-23T00:00:00.0Z</pubDate>
<description>This channel has multiple TTS RSS items. This is item two.</description>
<guid>urn:uuid:cf093eed-66f2-4dee-bdad-02ff0510194b</guid>
</item>
</channel>
</rss>

 

[Nick]

Hmm, that says it should ignore the additional items.

Only thing I can think is if it doesn't like the youtube embed type code in the post contents.

Also the proper punctuation is relying on users!

 

[Old Warwickshire lad]

Anyone else lost??

I was lost before I started.

 

[Old Warwickshire lad]

I miss the 80s

I miss the 60,s lol

 

[Old Warwickshire lad]

Thanks for the comprehensive low-down, Otis, but I think this is a bit too "Star Trekish" for my liking! Are Alexa's jokes any good?

Sent from my LG-H850 using Tapatalk

No

 

[Old Warwickshire lad]

so its like a wife ?

:emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing::emoji_laughing:

 

[shmmeee]

Hmm, that says it should ignore the additional items.

Only thing I can think is if it doesn't like the youtube embed type code in the post contents.

Also the proper punctuation is relying on users!

I was thinking just the post titles which limits it a bit on embedded media. Emojis might be an issue, but you could write something to strip them out.

I know fuck all about RSS feeds. Could I just host my own and do preprocessing on the SBT one to make it meet the format requirements then serve up the modified version?

 

[Nick]

I was thinking just the post titles which limits it a bit on embedded media. Emojis might be an issue, but you could write something to strip them out.

I know fuck all about RSS feeds. Could I just host my own and do preprocessing on the SBT one to make it meet the format requirements then serve up the modified version?

That would work, it would be a case of loading it, parsing it and then spitting it back out in the format you need.

 

[shmmeee]

That would work, it would be a case of loading it, parsing it and then spitting it back out in the format you need.

I'll have a squiz at the weekend and see if I can get something working. Then you have to go through certification to allow others to use it, which seems to take ages. If I get anything working I'll post videos up for feedback.

 

[Nick]

Can see it now

"Who's the daddy of Sky Blues Talk Alexa?"

ES HAITCH EM EM E E E is the daddy.

 

[shmmeee]

Can see it now

"Who's the daddy of Sky Blues Talk Alexa?"

ES HAITCH EM EM E E E is the daddy.

Ha! I have already put one Easter Egg in. I’ll spoil it because it’s not likely to ever be heard (thanks to your excellent web mastering).

You have to set a message for when the feed is down, so I chose:

Sky Blues Talk is down.

Go outside Otis

 

[Somerset Sky Blue]

Did anyone get an Alexa skill to work for the sky blues?
Just got one for Christmas and even though I can select Coventry as my football team, it says the next fixture is the fa cup - doesn't cover league two!

 

[Nick]

Shmeee was messing about with it, but he is being a judas and moving now so will probably make a Portsmouth one!

 

[shmmeee]

Rumbled.

I had a bit of a play, but it was more work than it looked and I’m a lazy fuck. I might have another pop at it. No promises.

 

[Alan Dugdales Moustache]

I clicked on this thread thinking Alexa Skill was a player we were signing.

 

[Gazolba]

For Redskins news I say 'Alexa, open Redskins Fan' and it gives me a flash briefing.

I prefer not to flash my briefs, thank you.