TTS on Alexa when entering a area that is not "home"

Configuration Voice Assistant
1

As title says,
Anyone know if or have something like this running?
I am terrible with yaml file (keep breaking HA) so please if possible can it be avoided.

2

Yes

You could put together an automation to do this using only the UI editor. But, if you have more than a couple zones to monitor, it would get very annoying to do. Using templates to extract and process all those options makes this much easier to set up.

Instead of trying to set this up directly in the automations.yaml file, do it through the UI automation editor using the “Edit in YAML” option in the menu at the top right of the page. That will prevent you from breaking HA… it won’t let you save a broken automation.

alias: Alexa Notify People Entering Zones
trigger:
  platform: state
  entity_id:
    - person.1
    - person.2
condition:
  - condition: template
    value_template: "{{ trigger.to_state.state not in ['home', 'not_home'] }}"
action:
  - service: notify.alexa_media_YOUR_ECHO_DEVICE
    data:
      message: "{{ trigger.name }} has arrived at {{ trigger.to_state.state }}"
      data:
        type: tts

This is the actual automation I use, which covers both arriving and leaving.

alias: Alexa - Notify - D&A Location
description: ''
trigger:
  - platform: state
    entity_id:
      - person.d
      - person.a
condition:
  - condition: state
    entity_id: binary_sensor.house_occupied
    state: 'on'
  - condition: state
    entity_id: input_boolean.a_in_bed
    state: 'off'
action:
  - choose:
      - conditions:
          - condition: template
            value_template: '{{ trigger.to_state.state not in ["home", "not_home"]}}'
        sequence:
          - service: notify.alexa_media_living_room_dot
            data:
              message: '{{trigger.name}} has arrived at {{trigger.to_state.state}}'
              data:
                type: tts
      - conditions:
          - condition: template
            value_template: >-
              {{ trigger.from_state.state != "not_home" and
              trigger.to_state.state != "home"}}
        sequence:
          - service: notify.alexa_media_living_room_dot
            data:
              message: '{{trigger.name}} has left {{trigger.from_state.state}}'
              data:
                type: tts
    default: []
mode: parallel

One thing to be aware of is that these will not work with passive zones since they do not register as the state of the person entity. If you have set up your zones as passive zones, you will need to use Zone triggers.

3

Ok cheers dude, I will give this a try when I got a free afternoon. Will message you how it goes lol.
Templates are out of my leuge too lol.

Been trying to watch some videos but they never quite what I want. If I can get that once it will slap me around the face like a wet fish lol.

4

hey guys, i have a problem, i cannot get alexa to say absolutely anything. i have tried all sorts looking on the net and its all talking Chinese and i got no idea whats its talking about. i have updated HA hoping it would fix the issue but to no success.

HA version is 2022.8.0

getting really frustrated, i’m trying everything that i can see on the net and i either hit a wall due to not knowing what they on about or it just don’t work