aws_iot_mailbox

A simple project that demonstrates the power of IoT along with an Alexa Skill to check mail.

It has 2 main components

• A Mailbox IOT device that acts as a shadow for a physical mailbox. For the purpose of this project, it is a virtual IOT device.
• An Alexa Skill to check whether there are any mails and to reset the state of the mailbox.

The Mailbox state management logic is relatively straight-forward for the purpose of illustration. A more complex logic can be built using multiple sensors, such as, a photo sensor in combination with the open/close sensor.

• The Mailbox manager lambda sets the mailbox state to having mail if it is opened within the delivery schedule.
• If opened more than once within the delivery schedule or post delivery schedule, the mailbox state is reset (i.e., mail has been cleared).

Setup

Pre-requisites

• Register for an AWS Account
• Register for an Amazon Developer Account
• Install and set up AWS CLI
• Install and set up ASK CLI

Setup Instructions

1. Mailbox IOT Device Setup

1.1 Create an IOT Role

aws iam create-role --role-name iot-role --assume-role-policy-document file://iot_role_trust.json

1.2 Create an IOT Policy and attach Role

aws iam create-policy --policy-name "Mailbox-Policy" --policy-document file://mailbox_policy.json
aws iam attach-role-policy --role-name iot-role --policy-arn "arn:aws:iam::281672010130:policy/Mailbox-Policy"

1.3 Create a Thing Type

aws iot create-thing-type --thing-type-name "Mailbox" --thing-type-properties "thingTypeDescription=Mailbox, searchableAttributes=isOpen,hasMail"

1.4 Create a Mailbox Thing

aws iot create-thing --thing-name "MyMailbox" --thing-type-name "Mailbox" --attribute-payload "{\"attributes\": {\"isOpen\": \"false\", \"hasMail\": \"false\"}}"

1.5 Create the MailboxManager lambda

• Edit the mailbox_manager.cfn and replace the following.
  • IOT_BROKER_ENDPOINT: Update this to point to the REST API endpoint of your thing from Device Details->Interact.
  • IOT_BROKER_REGION: Update this for your device region.
  • IOT_THING_NAME: The mailbox IOT device name (if different from "MyMailbox").
• Use the mailbox_manager.cfn to create the lambda that manages the updates to the Mailbox IOT device.
• After the lambda is created, add a trigger from "Alexa Skills Kit".

1.6 Create a Rule to update Mailbox

• Specify the query to fetch data from an IOT topic. SELECT isOpen FROM 'mail' WHERE isOpen <> '' Note: The name of the topic is 'mail'.
• Specify an action to associate the above lambda (MailboxManager) when this rule is triggered.

2. Mailbox Alexa Skill Setup

• Run the following command to create a new Mailbox skill in your developer account. ask new
• Update the alexa/lambda/custom/index.js for the following.
  • APP_ID: Update this to use the App ID created above.
  • IOT_BROKER_ENDPOINT: Update this to point to the REST API endpoint of your thing from Device Details->Interact.
  • IOT_BROKER_REGION: Update this for your device region.
  • IOT_THING_NAME: The mailbox IOT device name (if different from "MyMailbox").
• Run the following command to set up the Mailbox Alexa Skill. cd alexa ask deploy
• After first deployment edit the deployed IAM role ask-lambda-Mailbox and attach AWSIoTFullAccess policy to it.
• Once the skill has been deployed, enable the "Test" button to start testing the skill.

Testing

• Use the AWS IoT Console to publish a message to the 'mail' topic. Use the payload below for reference and manipulate the value for "isOpen". { "isOpen": "false" }
• Go to the above Mailbox skill->Testing and try the following utterances. check mail reset

Troubleshooting

Check out the following CloudWatch log groups.

• MailboxManager: For troubleshooting the Mailbox IOT device events.
• Mailbox: For the Alexa Skill processing troubleshooting.

Built With

• alexa-skill
• aws-iot