I have an automation when I ask Alexa if the mail has arrived she responds with yes or no. I set up a binary sensor helper that sets a value when motion is received. Then, I created a script that reports the state of it through the Alexa Media Player TTS. Success! But, I am wondering if there is a better way to do this? I query Alexa, I get the recognition sound, and then a second later I get the notification sound - just not the smoothest process.
announce_mail_arrival:
alias: 'announce mail arrival'
sequence:
- service: notify.alexa_media
data:
target: media_player.dining_room_echo
data:
type: announce
method: tts
message: 'The mail has {% if is_state("input_boolean.motion_detected",
"on") -%} arrived. {%- else -%} not arrived. {%- endif %}'
The current automation (5 second video) https://imgur.com/a/U8BKqhM
NB: I looked into Actionable notifications, and I actually set one up to tell me that my door has been open for 5 minutes, and then ask if I should turn my light off. These are super cool! However, I have no idea how to turn that into anything like what I’m doing.