Amazon has finally released the Amazon routines. A feature that was first “accidentally” pushed 2 years ago.
I have to say, Amazon surpassed Google Home’s shortcuts. Even though thermostats, cameras and sonos speakers are not supported, the lights, locks and Harmony activities are, along with weather, traffic and news updates.
I was going mad trying to figure out where they were when the app update notes said they were added a couple days ago. Good to see it live. Setup one for goodnight and one for good morning.
The prerequisite is disabling ST routines, so you don’t have conflicting names …
Yeah, I don’t have my st goodnight routine connected since it involves locks.
I’m also glad that this features been enabled, it wish you could include SmartThings routines instead of just devices.
Set your SmartThings routine to start with a virtual switch and then just include turning on that virtual switch in your echo routine. 
Very good advice. This would actually be a good use for Alexa Helper. (http://thingsthataresmart.wiki/index.php?title=Alexa_Helper). This app allows you to create virtual switches directly from the app and then have actions occur when clicked.
In addition, Ask Alexa will allow this functionality to be used even more in the next release. Possibly situations with no more invocation names! This is slated for the next few weeks, so stand by for greatness!
I think Amazon rushed to get this out because it seems half baked. Devices are duplicated and cant be deleted, as well its crashing and locking up. Sometimes it not always who is first… its who does it the best.
They were trying to beat the next big Evolution. And they succeeded beating the last. I give them a few more years before they catch up with… the next best thing…
I made this post as a reply to you on the ES thread Bobby. Probably more appropriate over here on this thread.
It become viewable in my App about 20 minutes ago. Kind of bizarre as the client and app remained the same.
Anyway, this isn’t exactly what I was thinking. It’s very very limited in the functional elements you can add. I was thinking for example that you would be able to add one or more of your Echo devices to it, and then a command to play Lithium on Sirius/XM and a command to set the volume.
You can add weather, traffic, news and turn on / off devices and control brightness of lights, lock doors, and can add existing scenes.
You cannot add an ST Routine as they do not show up under Scenes like they do if you add a Group in Alexa. I can actually run an ST Routine from a Group I have added in Alexa.
One of the things they stated in the What’s New is the ability to automate smart home and audio actions (all I can see for audio is turning on or off my Bose speakers) with a command. Maybe I missed or overlooked that somewhere in the app.
Do they plan on extending this functionality?
What’s your thoughts or opinion on what they have made available in the Routines?
I was wondering why many of my devices are duplicates and just thought it was only happening to me.
Which type of scenario do you recommend in Alexa Helper? Sorry I’ve had this smartapp installed for a while but never used it. Also which type of virtual switch - Alexa switch or momentary button tile?
I think is revolutionary in some ways, but lacks substance in many others. It’s interesting twist to have voice command on one device, and to play a routine on another. I believe that once they enable the feature where you can control routines based on the Echo device location , that might be a game changer but untill then… One step forward, 10 more to go.
Amazon automatically adds Hue devices every time it runs a discovery, so its recommended to disable them from being detected in the ST app so they are not doubled. If you have other home automation systems, you should probably remove Hue and other devices from multiple platforms so they are only picked up once.
Enable it for native use you mean? 
I think the duplicates are displaying the way they used to where if it gets added from ST into Alexa and Alexa also discovered it from the device itself, you will see 2 devices with the same name. Example in mine are all the Hue Lights. The problem with it in Routines is that you don’t know which device is the ST or Alexa direct device, not visually anyway.
To prevent hue from discovery, you need to contact Amazon support. But that works once. Then it’s game again. My work around has been renaming the Hue bulbs in ST, so I know where they are coming from…
One step = 2 years
They need an “exclusion” list… hmm… fantastic idea!
Step 4 of 10
