App Actions: Displaying a widget in Google Assistant via a dynamic shortcut

Question

My question is relatively simple considering the options shown in the official documentation and code labs but i've been struggling to make it work.

I want to trigger a widget to be shown in Google Assistant via a dynamic shortcut. Seems pretty straightforward but when implementing a capability and dynamic shortcut like this:

<capability
    android:name="actions.intent.GET_RESERVATION">
    <app-widget
        android:identifier="GET_MY_RESERVATION"
        android:targetClass="com.myapp.widget.MyWidget">
        <parameter
            android:name="reservation.reservationFor.name"
            android:key="shortcutId"
            android:required="true"
            app:shortcutMatchRequired="true" />
        <extra android:name="hasTts" android:value="true"/>
    </app-widget>
    <intent
        android:identifier="GET_MY_RESERVATION_FALLBACK"
        android:action="android.intent.action.VIEW"
        android:targetClass="com.myapp.widget.MyWidget">
    </intent>
</capability>

val shortcut = ShortcutInfoCompat.Builder(context, "shortcut_id")
        .setShortLabel("shortcut label"))
        .setExcludedFromSurfaces(ShortcutInfoCompat.SURFACE_LAUNCHER)
        .setLongLived(false)
        .addCapabilityBinding(
            "actions.intent.GET_RESERVATION",
            "reservation.reservationFor.name",
            context.resources.getStringArray(R.array.synonyms).toList()
        )
        .setIntent(Intent(context, MyWidget::class.java).apply {
            action = Intent.ACTION_VIEW
        })
        .setRank(2)
        .build()
ShortcutManagerCompat.pushDynamicShortcut(context, shortcut)

The intent defined for the shortcut is the one triggered rather then the widget defined for the capability. Moreover, the shortcut definition above is crashing the app since it expects its intent to be something that could be invoked via startActivity() (and a widget is not).

If i define the same shortcut statically:

<shortcut
    android:shortcutId="shortcut_id"
    android:shortcutShortLabel="shortcut label">
    <capability-binding
        android:key="actions.intent.GET_RESERVATION">
        <parameter-binding
            android:key="reservation.reservationFor.name"
            android:value="@array/synonyms" />
    </capability-binding>
</shortcut>

I can omit the intent and triggering this action will delegate the logic to the capability's widget as expected. Unfortunately I couldnt find a way to create a dynamic shortcut without an intent.

Anything im missing here? Help is appreciated.

Answer 1

When you add the addCapabilityBinding call on the ShortcutInfoCompat builder, you're telling the Google Assistant that this Android shortcut can be listed as a Google Assistant shortcut. After triggering the code that pushes the shortcut, your shortcut should appear in two places: after long pressing the app icon, and at the Google Assistant's settings (you can type "my shortcuts" on Google Assistant to see a list of available shortcuts). I tried to add a shortcut on an emulator but unfortunately I couldn't see it on Google Assistant. More info in the official documentation.

This, though, doesn't seem like what you're trying to accomplish: trigger a widget from an Android shortcut. The Intent that you have to define here has to be an Android intent. In most cases, we declare an Android intent with an Activity from the host app but you can deeplink into other apps if you have the info. It turns out that I've already made some apps that deeplink from my Android app into the Google Assistant. You can try something like this:

.setIntent(Intent(Intent.ACTION_VIEW, Uri.parse("https://assistant.google.com/services/invoke/uid/YOUR_UDID?intent=actions.intent.GET_TAXI_RESERVATION")))

Where YOUR_UDID is the one listed on the App Actions Plugin. I guess that once your app is in production, the UDID will be different. I could get this working with this instruction :) Hope this helps.

Answer 2

When you add the addCapabilityBinding call on the ShortcutInfoCompat builder, you're telling the Google Assistant that this Android shortcut can be listed as a Google Assistant shortcut. After triggering the code that pushes the shortcut, your shortcut should appear in two places: after long pressing the app icon, and at the Google Assistant's settings (you can type "my shortcuts" on Google Assistant to see a list of available shortcuts). I tried to add a shortcut on an emulator but unfortunately I couldn't see it on Google Assistant. More info in the official documentation.