Multi-turn dialogue in alexa skill - dialog

Question

We developing a skill it requires multi-turn dialog. However, when alexa is confirming the first slot it throws up saying "There was a problem with the requested skill's response."
The lambda code that alexa calls looks like this.
'DialogIntent': function(){
if (this.event.request.dialogState === "STARTED") {
console.log("in STARTED");
var updatedIntent = this.event.request.intent;
this.emit(":delegate", updatedIntent);
} else if (this.event.request.dialogState !== "COMPLETED") {
console.log("in not completed");
this.emit(":delegate", updatedIntent);
} else {
console.log("in completed");
return this.event.request.intent.slots;
}
return null;
}
we are doing everything suggested in https://developer.amazon.com/docs/custom-skills/dialog-interface-reference.html
Can you let us know if we are missing something?

Answer 1

My Answer
You aren't defining the updatedIntent variable during responses when the Dialog state is in any state other than started. To fix this, try moving the updatedIntent declaration to just before the if/else statement.
'DialogIntent': function(){
var updatedIntent = this.event.request.intent;
if (this.event.request.dialogState === "STARTED") {
this.emit(":delegate", updatedIntent);
} else if (this.event.request.dialogState !== "COMPLETED") {
this.emit(":delegate", updatedIntent);
} else {
return this.event.request.intent.slots;
}
return null;
}
The reason this is needed is because each request will set the Dialog to one of three states 1) STARTED which is sent only on the first request of a Dialog, 2) IN_PROGRESS which it is set to in every following request until the dialog is finished, and COMPLETE which it is set to once all of the required slots have been filled and any necessary confirmation is fulfilled.
In your example, you only set updatedIntent on requests with the dialog state set to STARTED, so only on the first request of a dialog. Every request after that will skip the initial step in the if statement, thus never defining the updated intent variable, which you try to pass back to Alexa in the 'else if' statement.
Refactor #1
If you do not need to do any additional set up when the dialog state has just been "STARTED", you can omit that section from the if else statement all together, since you are doing the exact same thing in both === "STARTED and !== "COMPLETED":
'DialogIntent': function(){
var updatedIntent = this.event.request.intent;
if (this.event.request.dialogState !== "COMPLETED") {
this.emit(":delegate", updatedIntent);
} else {
return this.event.request.intent.slots;
}
return null;
}
Refactor #2
You probably don't need to use updatedIntent. All though I am not entirely sure how the Alexa Skills Kit in Node.js works (which I assume is what you're using), you shouldn't need to pass the updatedIntent back to Alexa. The updated intent variable is only needed if for some reason you need to update the intent manually in code. If you don't, Alexa can handle the entire dialog without it:
'DialogIntent': function(){
if (this.event.request.dialogState !== "COMPLETED") {
this.emit(":delegate");
} else {
return this.event.request.intent.slots;
}
return null;
}