How to play video from your Dropbox by name with My Video skill and Alexa routines
Recently Amazon introduced changes in the way Alexa routines interact with Alexa custom skills. It makes possible to create routines that are more productive and fun to use.
For example, the My Video skill’s integration with Alexa routines was very basic: a routine’s trigger could only launch the skill. You had to select a video playlist or a video by name to start a playback. Now, you can pass a name for a video file or for a video playlist to the routine. So, when it triggered a playback will start immediately.
Let us see how to configure a routine that will start playing your video by name.
- Go to Alexa app on your mobile phone.
- Go to the Menu > More > Routines
3. Create a new routine (tab “+” on top right corner):
4. Follow these steps to create a routine:
5. First step is to provide a name for a routine and then tap Next:
6. Second step is to select a trigger (when a routine will be triggered), for example a timer event:
7. Third step is to add an action. We will be using Skills as an action:
8. Select Your Skills:
9. Select the My Video skill from the list:
10. Select a custom action (second option) — Play a video or a video playlist by name from your Dropbox:
11. Provide a name for a video or a video playlist (e.g. Family) and then tap Next.
12. Choose Echo device you want to use (From):
13. Important: don’t forget to tap Save button to save your routine. Otherwise you will have to start from scratch.
14. Newly created routine will be added to the list of your routines:
Every time a trigger for your routine will be activated, the My Video Alexa skill will start playing a video of your choice.
