Echo Devices (Alexa) as Media Player - Testers Needed

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3729

Is anyone having issues using this with Alexa groups? I rely heavily on groups (aka smart home groups) and speaker groups in Alexa. Currently as a test I have a speaker group called “Office” that is the preferred speaker for a smart home group that contains two of my Echos. When either one of these hears me ask for music, it by default plays on that preferred speaker (which contains two Echos).

The problem is that when I do this, in HA, none of these three entities – media_player.echo1, media_player.echo2, or media_player.office (the group) show any activity at all. They all show as being on “Standby”.

Using this Alexa Media Player plugin, I am still able to mute the devices and control their volume from Lovelace, but I don’t get any play controls or track information to show up.

If I target a singular device, rather than a group, it works fine.

3730

Are you targeting the group via HA or outside of HA?

3731

I meant targeting an Alexa speaker group with my voice commands to Alexa. If my voice command results in Alexa playing over a speaker group, like the one I have called “office”, no play info ever shows up in HA. All the media player devices in HA show as “standby”, both the one reflecting the group and the ones for the individual echo devices.

If I tell Alexa to play music and it only plays on one device, rather than an Alexa speaker group, then HA reflects the play status correctly on that one media player device.

3732

Would need logs to know what is going on. In theory if it works for one it’ll work for the group and vice versa. If you want to try to debut it, open up a github issue with logs for alexapy showing the attempt that works and fails.

3733

Is it possible to set the volume with an announcement? I don’t want to always first set the volume and then play the announcement. Is a combination possible?

3734 
    action:
    - service: media_player.volume_set
      entity_id: group.alexa_wholehouse
      data:
        volume_level: '0.2'
3735

I know how to set the volume as a single service … im talking about the volume_level in an announcement… something like that:

action:
    - service: notify.alexa_media_echo_1
      data:
        message: "Hello World!"
        volume_level: '0.2'

I want to combine the announcement with the volume. Is this possible somehow instead of first setting up the volume, and the setting up the announcement.

3736

I’m struggling to get BBc Radio Two to play via media_player .play_media via tunin using the below

‘media_content_id: BBC Radio two
media_content_type: TUNEIN
entity_id: media_player.xxx_room’

I do have the BBC app installed but don’t know how to make that the content type …
Anyone able to assist ??

3737

No.

Yes, the Wiki (expand Service Examples)

3738 
type or paste co  br_capital_fm:
    sequence:
      - service: media_player.play_media
        data:
          entity_id: media_player.bedroom
          media_content_id: capital london
          media_content_type: TUNEINde here

this is a script , that you can call with a button in the media card

  - artwork: cover
    columns: 2
    entity: media_player.livingroom
    hide_volume: false
    icon: 'mdi:amazon-alexa'
    icon_state: true
    idle_view:
      when_idle: true
      when_paused: true
      when_standby: true
    name: Living_room
    power_color: true
    scroll_info: true
    shortcuts:
      buttons:
        - icon: 'mdi:disc'
          id: script.lr_capital_fm
          type: script
3739

I can get the serice to call other stations just not able to get any BBC stations

3740 
            http://bbcmedia.ic.llnwd.net/stream/bbcmedia_radio1_mf_p

:slight_smile:

1 Like
3741

I’m not getting past the authentication issue.

I get 3 options after I pass Captcha: push to my tablet, push to my phone and sms to my phone.

I’ve setup the 2FA on Google Authenticator but that still doesn’t show up as an option.

Not sure what to respond with to get either push to my tablet or push to my phone.

I’ve tried responding with “sms” then I assume it is asking for the code. I get no text. I’ve tried putting in the GA code but it doesn’t take that.

What response would I use to tell it push or Google Authenticator?

Thanks!

1 Like
3742

Read this comment in the issue previously posted.

3743

I recently installed Alexa media player but I can not find any alarm_control_panel.alexa_guard_xxxx entity so I can turn guard on and off

3744

Make sure you have Guard enabled in the Alexa App and restart

3745

Guard is enabled in the alexa app and I restarted home assistant, but still not there, I did not add my phone when I added my other alexa devices, how do I do that after the fact

3746

Are you using include_devices? Disable that and it’ll autopopulate. Otherwise you’ll have to include it manually.

3747

I installed Alexa media player through HACS. I can’t seem to find where it stores its configuration information, its not in my configuration.yaml

3748

If you used the Integrations page, you would need to remove and add the entity again to change the configuration. However, if you don’t remember choosing any include_devices than it’s a different issue. Are you logging into the right Amazon domain for your region? This would disable Alexa Guard if it was wrong. Won’t be able to know definitively without the alexa_media logs.