Amazon Alexa

cloudby ALYT

What it adds to a house

reaches your things.

How a person connects it

Method: external. Linking starts in the Alexa app: enable the ALYT add-on there, sign in to ALYT and choose the home. What you say to Alexa is heard by Amazon, not by the house; only the request reaches ALYT.

What it can look for

Nothing: it does not look for things on the network.

What stops working when it is disconnected

Alexa stops seeing and controlling this home until it is linked again from the Alexa app.

The descriptor

Connection fields are served for a program at /connectors/alexa.json.

{
  "source": "built-in",
  "visibility": "public",
  "listed": true,
  "version": "1.0.0",
  "docsUrl": "https://developers.alyt.com/connectors/alexa",
  "kind": "ALEXA",
  "logo": {
    "url": "/integrations/logos/alexa.svg",
    "color": "#00CAFF",
    "ratio": 1.56,
    "background": "#FFFFFF",
    "inset": 0.12,
    "scale": 1
  },
  "name": "Amazon Alexa",
  "icon": "audio-lines",
  "connectivity": "cloud",
  "brings": [],
  "connect": {
    "method": "external",
    "fields": [],
    "linkedClientId": "alyt-alexa",
    "help": "Linking starts in the Alexa app: enable the ALYT add-on there, sign in to ALYT and choose the home. What you say to Alexa is heard by Amazon, not by the house; only the request reaches ALYT.",
    "linkedHelp": "For \"Alexa, turn on the lights\" to mean the room you are in, put each Echo, or Sonos with Alexa, and that room's things in one group in the Alexa app (Devices, plus, Add group). Amazon offers no way for ALYT to do it for you."
  },
  "discovery": null,
  "disconnect": {
    "consequence": "Alexa stops seeing and controlling this home until it is linked again from the Alexa app."
  },
  "author": {
    "kind": "alyt",
    "name": "ALYT",
    "url": "https://alyt.com"
  }
}

The guide

Amazon Alexa is a cloud connector that links a household in the Alexa app, then exposes ALYT devices and routines to Alexa’s own smart-home grammar. It does not use an ALYT app pairing flow, and it does not hear household speech; Amazon hears the phrase first, then sends ALYT only the directive that matters. Local ALYT functions keep working during a cloud outage, but Alexa control needs Amazon, the network, and a live link.

How it connects

Linking starts in the Alexa app. The household enables the ALYT add-on there, signs in to ALYT, and chooses the home to link. For a person to say “Alexa, turn on the lights” and mean the room they are in, each Echo, or Sonos with Alexa, must be placed with that room’s things in one group in the Alexa app. ALYT cannot create that group for them.

The connector is cloud-to-cloud. If Amazon’s path is unavailable, Alexa cannot reach the house. When the household unlinks, Alexa stops seeing and controlling that home until it is linked again from the Alexa app.

What Alexa sees

Alexa discovers the house from ALYT’s overview and routines. It sees endpoints, room-based control, and routines as Alexa scenes. Discovery is limited to 300 endpoints per customer and 100 capabilities per endpoint.

ALYT maps supported device families to Alexa interfaces like this:

ALYT capability	Alexa interface(s)	Notes
light	PowerController; BrightnessController when dim; ColorController when color; ColorTemperatureController when color_temp	Alexa color uses HSB; warmth uses Kelvin
switch	PowerController	category follows the presented type
thermostat	ThermostatController; TemperatureSensor when the thing also reports one	Celsius on the wire
lock	LockController	locked, unlocked, and jammed are exposed; the response can be deferred
media_player	Speaker; PlaybackController when transport	volume and mute are available
fan	PowerController; PercentageController when speed
cover	RangeController	open and close semantics
sensor.contact, sensor.motion, sensor.temperature	ContactSensor, MotionSensor, TemperatureSensor	read only
voice	ToggleController, instance Hub.Listening	controls the room’s listening action
camera	none	no Alexa camera stream support is exposed here
routine	SceneController, SCENE_TRIGGER	activation runs the routine
every endpoint	EndpointHealth	Alexa shows offline instead of failing silently

A thing’s ALYT name becomes the Alexa friendly name with Alexa-specific disambiguation for speakers and locks. The room is carried in the description; Alexa has no room field in discovery.

What it can do

Alexa can turn devices on and off, adjust supported values, lock and unlock where the device allows it, run room actions, and activate routines. Routine activation is exposed as an Alexa scene, so voice control uses Alexa’s own commands such as “turn on” or “activate” the scene name.

For state, Alexa reads current stored state on demand and also receives pushed change reports so tiles stay current. Pushed state is available only when the household has a live Alexa link and the Amazon event path is available.

What it cannot do

Alexa does not expose camera streaming here. It does not create household groups, routines, or custom Alexa phrases for the household. It does not take over local control: ALYT’s local functions continue to work without the cloud, but Alexa does not.

Some commands can be deferred when the device needs more time, such as locks. A command that is not confirmed fast enough returns a deferred response and finishes through the event path.

What to check when it fails

If linking fails, confirm the Alexa app is using the same Amazon account, the ALYT home was chosen during linking, and the household is in the correct Alexa region. If Alexa shows devices but control fails, check that Amazon is online, the home still has a live link, and the device is within the supported capability set.

If state tiles are stale, check that change reporting is active and that the link still has valid event permissions. If a routine does not appear as a scene, check that the routine exists in ALYT and that Alexa discovery has been run again after the routine was added.

If Alexa says a device is offline, verify the device’s own health in ALYT. Alexa reports endpoint health rather than silently hiding failures.

Access boundaries

Household permissions are narrower than staff permissions. DEV credentials work in the developer sandbox. LIVE credentials work only for their own installed connector.