The Skill Validator is a skill validation tool that checks for errors and warnings in an Alexa custom skill’s language model and skill metadata. It can be used from the developer dashboard (https://developer.amazon.com). While it can’t check for everything that will cause a skill to fail certification or all factors that create a poor customer experience, it checks for the low-hanging fruit.
The goal for this project is to add more transparency to the developer process and add another self-service tool to a developer's toolbelt while they create custom Alexa skills. A skill is not required to pass all these tests to be submitted for certification.
Most of the tests come from the Ask Submission Checklist.
Copy and paste this code into a new GreaseMonkey user script: https://github.com/alexa/alexa-skills-kit-skill-validator/blob/mainline/output/greasemonkey.js
- Download the extension: https://github.com/alexa/alexa-skills-kit-skill-validator/blob/mainline/output/chrome_ask_validator.crx
- Navigate to
chrome://extensions/ - Drag and drop the .crx file into the tab
- Accept the permissions
- Download the extension: https://github.com/alexa/alexa-skills-kit-skill-validator/blob/mainline/output/firefox_ask_validator.xpi
- Navigate to
about:config - Search for xpinstall.signatures.required and set to “false”
- Navigate to Menu > Add-ons
- Drag and drop the .xpi file into the tab
- Accept the permissions
- In the developer portal, when editing a skill, a button appears bottom right with the text “Validate Skill.”
- As the tests, run a modal will pop up with progress status.
- Check the detailed results against your language model and metadata.
- Errors may cause a skill to fail certification; fixed warnings will generally improve the customer experience.
- False positives are possible across tests, verify against documentation where available--open an issue with examples.
- Limited support for non-English skills (can you help write these REGEX?).
- No checking for built-in slot and custom slot utterance collision—or for where slots collide with utterance plain text.
- This is not a complete battery of tests.
- If you know how to fix an issue that you run into and/or would like to add an SLU/other test, submit a pull request for the code base.
- Otherwise open an issue