Display Step (Alexa-Only)

Display Step (Alexa / APL - Only)

The Display Step will allow you to create or upload visuals formatted in APL (Alexa Presentation Language), a visual design framework designed specifically for use on Alexa skills.

The Display Step allows you to build interactive voice and visual experiences across the Alexa-supported/enabled device landscape. This added experience can make skills more delightful and engaging to your end-user.

Note: For more information on Alexa Presentation Language (APL) navigate to the official APL Documentation from Amazon Alexa found here.

Display Type

There are two options available for adding APL visuals to your assistant:

• Basic (formerly Splash) - allows you to quickly create text and visual assets
• Custom (formerly Advanced) - allows you to upload and APL .json file that can contain visuals, animations and interactions, unlocking multimodal Alexa displays/mediums

Creating a Basic Display

A Basic or Splash Display is the Alexa conversation designers' most seamless and quickest method to deploy APL on Voiceflow.

You are able to input a title or use a variable to display dynamic content. You can also drag-and-drop an image into the editor, upload an image from your computer!

Tip: You can also or provide a link/URL to an image to add the intended visual element by clicking the icon on the top-right corner. You can also use a variable to manipulate functionality by using '{'.

To preview the Splash Display, upload your image and click the Preview button in the footer. You're then able to cycle between the common device displays of your Splash image.

Adding a Custom/Advanced Display

The advanced function the Display Step for APL allows you to upload or use an APL template in your skill. This can allow you to leverage powerful functionality such as dynamically updating your assistant, in the APL setting.

You can use drag-and-drop to import an APL (.json file) into the editor to add it to your assistant. You can also create and export these APL .json files from Alexa's Authoring Tool.

Tip: Any data sources or commands that are outlined in your APL file will be shown in the editor. You can edit that information to include variables if you want to include dynamic data in your APL.

To preview the APL Display, click the Preview button in the footer.

For more advanced technical documentation on Alexa Presentation Language (APL) and to leverage Advanced Display, reference Voiceflow developer documentation on this topic here.

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