Is it possible to play a stream and perform custom interactions with the same skill?

[diegoasef]

Hi, I'm working on a skill that plays radio streams. I'm trying to offer interactions with my skill while playing the stream. For example, asking "what is the current show", "what is the current song" or Send a like while listening to the radio. So far, I can only do this only with a full invocation: i.e: "Alexa, ask Radio Test what song is playing" The HelpIntent has the same issue in this example.

It would be great to have direct interactions with an active stream. It has many other use cases. Is this possible?

Thanks,

[sebsto]

Hello,

This is not possible. While the stream is playing, the session ends, allowing customers to engage with Alexa for something else, like smart home control, weather or engage with another skill.

Amazon forwards to the currently playing skill the "next", "previous", "stop" etc. utterances to allow your skill to control the flow. But all other utterances must be explicitly directed to your skill : "Alexa, ask my skill what is playing now"

See https://developer.amazon.com/docs/custom-skills/audioplayer-interface-reference.html#intents for more details

Seb

[diegoasef]

Hi @sebsto,

Thanks a lot for your answer. I think it would be nice to see in the future additional methods to provide better context for Alexa, like "What is playing"

Thanks, Diego

[akhakiani]

Hi I do not have much developer skills. How do I use this code to play my custom songs on the cloud using Alexa ? thanks Altaj