Building Response

Note: Sign in to the developer console to build or publish your skill.

Standard response

If you are using the lambda as your skill endpoint, you are only responsible for providing the response body in order for Alexa to respond to a customer request. For more details about the JSON structure of the response body, see Response Format.

A response body contains the following properties:

version
sessionAttributes
response

ASK SDK v2 for Node.js helps filling the version and sessionAttributes so you can focus on building the response instead of writing boilerplate code.

ResponseBuilder

The ResponseBuilder includes helper methods for constructing the response. A Response may contain multiple elements, and the helper methods aid in generating responses, reducing the need to initialize and set the elements of each response. ResponseBuilder is available to handlers via the HandlerInput container object. The detailed description of ResponseBuilder can be found in the TypeDoc.

Available methods

speak(speechOutput: string, playBehavior? : ui.PlayBehavior): this;
reprompt(repromptSpeechOutput: string, playBehavior? : ui.PlayBehavior): this;
withSimpleCard(cardTitle: string, cardContent: string): this;
withStandardCard(cardTitle: string, cardContent: string, smallImageUrl?: string, largeImageUrl?: string): this;
withLinkAccountCard(): this;
withAskForPermissionsConsentCard(permissionArray: string[]): this;
withCanFulfillIntent(canFulfillIntent : CanFulfillIntent) : this;
addDelegateDirective(updatedIntent?: Intent): this;
addElicitSlotDirective(slotToElicit: string, updatedIntent?: Intent): this;
addConfirmSlotDirective(slotToConfirm: string, updatedIntent?: Intent): this;
addConfirmIntentDirective(updatedIntent?: Intent): this;
addAudioPlayerPlayDirective(playBehavior: interfaces.audioplayer.PlayBehavior, url: string, token: string, offsetInMilliseconds: number, expectedPreviousToken?: string, audioItemMetadata? : AudioItemMetadata): this;
addAudioPlayerStopDirective(): this;
addAudioPlayerClearQueueDirective(clearBehavior: interfaces.audioplayer.ClearBehavior): this;
addRenderTemplateDirective(template: interfaces.display.Template): this;
addHintDirective(text: string): this;
addVideoAppLaunchDirective(source: string, title?: string, subtitle?: string): this;
withShouldEndSession(val: boolean): this;
addDirective(directive: Directive): this;
addDirectiveToReprompt(directive : Directive) : this;
getResponse(): Response;

The following example shows how to construct a response using ResponseBuilder helper methods.

JavaScript
TypeScript

Copied to clipboard.

const response = handlerInput.responseBuilder
  .speak('foo')
  .reprompt('bar')
  .withSimpleCard('title', 'cardText')
  .getResponse();

Copied to clipboard.

const response = handlerInput.responseBuilder
  .speak('foo')
  .reprompt('bar')
  .withSimpleCard('title', 'cardText')
  .getResponse();

Note: The contents of the speak and reprompt values get wrapped in SSML tags. This means that any special XML characters within the value need to be escape coded. ASK SDK provides SsmlUtils to help you escape the following invalid XML characters:
    • & -> &
    • > -> >
    • < -> <
    • ' -> '
    • " -> "

Image and text helpers

Warning: The Display interface is deprecated and isn't supported on all Alexa devices. To add multimodal experiences to your skill, use Alexa Presentation Language (APL) instead.

To learn about APL, see Add Visuals and Audio to Your Skill.

The Alexa Design System for APL includes a set of templates that are similar to the display templates, so you can transition your skill. For details about which templates to use, see Replace display templates with responsive templates.

ASK SDK v2 for Node.js provides the following helper classes to help you build text and image elements that are widely used in Echo Show compatible skills.

Copied to clipboard.

const Alexa = require('ask-sdk-core');

const myImage = new Alexa.ImageHelper()
  .withDescription('FooDescription')
  .addImageInstance('http://BarImageSource')
  .getImage();

Copied to clipboard.

import { ImageHelper } from 'ask-sdk-core';
import { interfaces } from 'ask-sdk-model';
import Image = interfaces.display.Image;

const myImage : Image = new ImageHelper()
  .withDescription('FooDescription')
  .addImageInstance('http://BarImageSource')
  .getImage();

PlainTextContentHelper

JavaScript
TypeScript

Copied to clipboard.

const Alexa = require('ask-sdk-core');

const myTextContent = new Alexa.PlainTextContentHelper()
  .withPrimaryText('Foo')
  .withSecondaryText('Bar')
  .withTertiaryText('Baz')
  .getTextContent();

Copied to clipboard.

import { PlainTextContentHelper } from 'ask-sdk-core';
import { interfaces } from 'ask-sdk-model';
import TextContent = interfaces.display.TextContent;

const myTextContent : TextContent = new PlainTextContentHelper()
  .withPrimaryText('Foo')
  .withSecondaryText('Bar')
  .withTertiaryText('Baz')
  .getTextContent();

RichTextContentHelper

JavaScript
TypeScript

Copied to clipboard.

const Alexa = require('ask-sdk-core');

const myTextContent = new Alexa.RichTextContentHelper()
  .withPrimaryText('Foo')
  .withSecondaryText('Bar')
  .withTertiaryText('Baz')
  .getTextContent();

Copied to clipboard.

import { RichTextContentHelper } from 'ask-sdk-core';
import { interfaces } from 'ask-sdk-model';
import TextContent = interfaces.display.TextContent;

const myTextContent : TextContent = new RichTextContentHelper()
  .withPrimaryText('Foo')
  .withSecondaryText('Bar')
  .withTertiaryText('Baz')
  .getTextContent();

Was this page helpful?

Provide feedback

Last updated: Nov 28, 2023