Amazon Alexa Workshop — Coimbatore Highlights

Source: Nidhin Kumar (Canva)

A new group named Amazon Alexa Meetup — Coimbatore was created in April 2019 in the Meetup community by Karthik Ragubathy and Sohan.

After a month got a mail from Alexa Meetup Coimbatore about the ASK Workshop

Didn’t spare a minute to click Attend Button and confirmed my reservation for the event.

Days went off ……….

Source: Google Images

And the day came on, as usual reached the location earlier because it would take more than 30 mins to find the hall because the Venue(PSG STEP) is big enough to find.

Finally spotted the hall within 15 mins

Source: Google Images

Wait there is no surprise in it right? Yes, there was a twist

The hall has been changed to somewhere. Started again to find the destination

Source: Google Images

At last, found the venue to my surprise the hall has filled up(How these guys found it?) and the event was about to kickstart. Settled in my space

Welcome Note

The welcome note was given by someone (Couldn’t remember his name:)

Source: Nidhin Kumar (Welcome Note)

Once the welcome note was over Karthik Ragubathy take the charge to start the session with a quiz

What is 4.54 billion years old ?

and everyone’s mind voice was like

Source: Google Images

After the quiz session, Karthik slowly explained the evolution of technologies and the era for Voice.

Then What’s inside an Amazon Echo device was explained (I understand only 8 mics are available and based the voice direction others mics will be in mute)

Source: Google Images

After the anatomy of Echo Device, it was the time to know about the Alexa Skills Kit and Karthik has taught ASK crisp and clean. Once the Introduction about ASK is completed. It was time to make our hands dirtier by creating a skill using ASK.

Though I have already created some skills earlier it was a surprise for me because of the new look of the Alexa Developer console and everything has been integrated into a single page.

Earlier we used to connect the AWS Lambda manually but now it is combined into a single page.

Source: Google Images (Old Alexa Developer Console)

Source: Nidhin Alexa Dashboard (New Developer Console)

And the first skill has been created very quickly by everyone. It was the time to take a quick break

Source: Google Images

After the break, everyone was in the aggressive mode to create another skill

Source: Google Images

And then we created another skill named Space Facts (Do you know this is the first meetup group to complete two skills before Lunch break — Said by Karthik)

Source: Google Images

Lunch Time

And the special lunch made by mom’s (Momade) has arrived and it was a fantastic lunch. thanks to all the mom’s who have prepared the lunch for us with love and a special thanks to the Momade Cuisines team

Source: Google Images

After Lunch

After lunch, it was the session about the voice design and the best practices to be carried out while designing for voice.

Source: Nidhin Kumar

It was the time for us to showcase our skills demo and to my surprise, there were nearly 19 teams who eagerly participated to showcase their skills with a lot of funs, drama, new ideas. I too showcased my skill :)

Source: Nidhin Kumar

And a special solo appearance made by Guru Pranav (Studying in 8th standard) has stolen the show with unique thinking.

Source: Nidhin Kumar

Once the Voice Design Jam was over it was the time to announce the winners and it was very tough for Karthik to select the winners.

Source: Nidhin Kumar (Winners of Voice Design Jam)

This is the last segment of this workshop. Karthik has shared the new features of Alexa and the resources to create Alexa skills and the incentives provided by Alexa.

Session gets wrapped with a Photoshoot(Didn’t get the photos yet) and some swags for the participants.

Source: Nidhin Kumar (Alexa Swags)

My Views about the workshop

Though I have attended the Alexa workshop conducted by Sohan Maheswar on 2018 @ Forge, Coimbatore. It was a new experience for me where I could see a lot of people are attending the workshop in Tier 2 cities and a lot of voluntary participation.