Two Voice Devs

Amazon has introduced an update to the Alexa Presentation Language, which allows #VoiceFirst developers to create more dynamic visuals. Mark and Allen discuss what these changes are and why they matter.

Based on a question from Will Rongholt, Mark and Allen discuss different approaches to implementing a #VoiceFirst game for Alexa skills or Actions on Google that provides a limited number of levels, after which players will need to make a purchase of some sort.

As we do #VoiceFirst development for platforms such as Amazon Alexa and Actions on the Google Assistant, we often find patterns in how we should interact with users between sessions, and the information we need to store to keep track of these interactions. Mark continues demonstrating to Allen the next two tools in the library: a streak counter and a recharge counter.

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As we do #VoiceFirst development for platforms such as Amazon Alexa and Actions on the Google Assistant, we often find patterns in how we should interact with users between sessions, and the information we need to store to keep track of these interactions. Mark shares with Allen a library he has begun for Jovo 4 to assist with some of these patterns and goes into detail about the first of these - a way to manage a randomized list of items so our visitors get a new item each time.

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It's that time of year again! Google I/O! When Google rolls out the latest tools and products for developers and everyone else to use. While Allen couldn't be there in person this year, he answers Mark's questions about what Google is doing in the #VoiceFirst space in general and with the Google Assistant, Actions on Google, App Actions, and the Matter protocol specifically.

With a basic understanding of how multivocal helps you create a configuration-driven #VoiceFirst app, Allen and Mark discuss how a configuration-driven content management system for multivocal ties it all together for designers, developers, and content creators.

Allen has been talking about multivocal for years, but what is it, and what does it do for developers? He and Mark talk about some of the underlying concepts about the multivocal library, how #VoiceFirst developers use it with platforms such as Amazon Alexa and Actions on Google, and how it can use Firebase Firestore for configuration and what this means as part of a content management system.

Recently, AWS announced that their Lambda functions could now be invoked directly via HTTP, rather than having to go through another AWS service to access it. Mark and Allen compare this (and Lambda in general) to Google Cloud Functions, which offer similar features, and why these are both important tools in the #VoiceFirst toolbelt.

In the last episode, Mark demonstrated some of his work on Jovo that would lead towards a #VoiceFirst CMS integration, and Allen commented "now all you need is a UI to manage the content". This week - Mark delivers by exploring how to use Sanity.io, a "headless CMS" to build the UI that will feed into the configuration.

Ever have one of those weekends where you have a programming idea, and you just can't get it out of your head, so you decide to code it? We all have! Mark had some ideas for how to create a Content Management System (CMS) built on top of Jovo, and he had to call Allen to share the idea and some early experiments with it. Along the way, we discuss some of Jovo's core concepts and set the stage for a #VoiceFirst CMS.