In late 2017, Amazon opened up push notifications for Alexa app developers, which means as long as people follow the guidelines, all kinds of apps can add push notifications to your Alexa-enabled speaker. This allows Alexa users to set push notifications for a growing number of Alexa skills and native abilities, so that Alexa can speak up on your device and give you important updates as you want them. Just what can Alexa do with these notifications? Here’s a list.
Even if you don’t see a capability on the list, it’s worth checking your Alexa skills to see if you can enable a voice alert. Fortunately, third party notifications won’t suddenly turn on by themselves. If you miss any enabled notifications, you can ask Alexa to review your recent notifications to make sure you caught everything.
Apps like Accuweather can provide you with weather warnings if there’s a particular alert for your area like high windows, flooding, and so on. You can also ask Alexa “What’s the weather like?” at any time to get a rundown of the temperature, forecast for the day, and any ongoing alerts. Make sure the location is set to your current town.
Recommended VideosApps such as Kayak can offer information on flights and flight times, as well as when planes have landed. This allows you to keep track of loved ones in the sky, plan for pickups at the airport, and many other useful things.
What would the world be like if we couldn’t find out the latest on our pizza order? One of the first third-party apps to enable notifications was, of course, Domino’s. They now allow customers in the United States to get notifications about their pizza orders. You can now be apprised of when the pizza is cooking and when it’s about to be delivered.
Alexa also provides a native traffic information notification option that you can add to your general Alexa morning update, or ask about at any time. Currently, this is one of Alexa ’s weakest offerings, since Alexa ’s sources of traffic information appears to be pretty limited, so it’s not much use outside urban areas.
The app provides updates on your loved ones, giving you notifications on where they are based on who you are tracking. This means you can set up the app to automatically notify you when someone with a tracker gets to school, leaves work, and so on. Like Domino’s, this is basically the same updates the app provides on its own, but set up as a voice notification via Alexa instead.
Alexa will automatically search for news headlines and provide them to you on demand (a feature that can be customized with various skills for different types of news). However, specific apps like The Washington Post offer the ability to enable automatic notifications. When an important piece of breaking news comes up on the skill, Alexa will tell you about it. This is one of those notifications that you’ll either love or hate, depending on how closely you follow the news.
Order something through Amazon, and Alexa will notify you when your package has shipped, so you can know when to expect it. You can also ask for additional updates on where the package is and if it’s out for delivery. This is especially useful for Prime users, who can expect many packages within two days but may want more specific information for important shipments.
Currently, sports-oriented skills rarely push notifications that prompt Alexa to speak on her own, but they do provide a wealth of information and updates on demand. You can search for skills to get updates on scores, sports news for your team, upcoming game days, injuries, fantasy league stats, and a lot more.
If you’ve forgotten what was added to a recent shopping list, just ask Alexa, and she’ll give you an update on all your shopping list items. Note that Alexa can now distinguish between different voices as well, which may cause her to create multiple shopping lists for different people. This could create some confusion if it happens unexpectedly.
You can also program Alexa to give you automatic reminders that you can set yourself.
These reminders are handy when you want Alexa to tell you about specific tasks that you may otherwise forget. You can specify the times that Alexa gives you the reminders, and make them re-occuring if necessary.
If it can be streamed, voice-activated, made better with an app, or beaten by mashing buttons, Tyler's into it. When he's not…
Labor Day washer and dryer deals: bundles and singles starting at $400
If you missed out on Labor Day yesterday, you'll be happy to know that there are still some Labor Day deals floating around for those who have been looking forward to the holiday to upgrade their washer and dryer. There are some fantastic washer and dryer deals involving the top brands such as LG, Samsung, Whirlpool, and GE, so there's no shortage of options, but you're going to have to decide on which bundle to buy quickly because we're not sure how long stocks for any of them will remain available.
Best Labor Day washer and dryer bundles to shop right now
Insignia 4.1 Cubic Feet High Efficiency Top Load Washer -- $400, was $550
The Insignia 4.1 Cubic Feet High Efficiency Top Load Washer has 11 automatic washing programs which cover a wide variety of different needs from heavy duty to delicates or hand washing. It has a variety of soil levels as well as a tub clean function, extensive temperature options, and delay start time option so you’re in full control of what you’re doing. Its stainless steel wash basket is built for durability while the large capacity is good for most homes. The Insignia 4.1 Cubic Feet High Efficiency Top Load Washer keeps things fairly simple but it has all the essentials you could need so you’re all set.
Labor Day carpet cleaner deals: Shark, Hoover, Dirt Devil, more
It's probably not at all shocking that carpets get incredibly dirty, and even though Labor Day is over, you can still grab yourself an excellent carpet cleaner deal with the late deals we've collected below. In fact, there are a surprising amount of options out there, even if you're looking for something that's a bit more budget-oriented. That's why we've collected the best Labor Day sales on carpet cleaners that are still around after Labor Day, although if you want a more traditional vacuum, check out these Labor Day cordless vacuum deals instead.
The best Labor Day carpet cleaner deals
Dirt Devil Portable Spot Compact Carpet Cleaner --
Hoover CleanSlate Plus Portable Carpet Cleaner --
Hoover PowerDash Pet Compact Carpet Cleaner --
Bissell Little Green Multi-Purpose Portable Carpet Cleaner --
Hoover PowerScrub Deluxe Carpet Cleaner --
Hoover SmartWash+ Automatic Carpet Cleaner --
Hoover SmartWash Pet Automatic Carpet Cleaner --
Bissell ProHeat 2X Revolution Pet Pro Plus --
It's probably no surprise that Amazon had a huge amount of excellent Labor Day deals yesterday, but you can actually still grab a lot of them, even though Labor Day is officially over. While there are a lot of various products on sale, we've been mostly looking at some of the best tech deals, which range from headphones deals to smart speaker deals and everything in between. We've collected some of our favorite tech offers below to get your mind jogging and your brain thinking about what you really want to score as the Labor Day sales peter out.
Amazon Echo Dot (5th Gen) -- $30, was $50
The Amazon Echo Dot (5th Gen) is featured in our roundup of the best Amazon Alexa smart speakers for its amazing sound quality and the ease of access that it provides to Amazon's Alexa, despite its compact size. You'll be able to ask the digital assistant to carry out a wide range of tasks through voice commands, such as searching for information, playing music, setting timers, and controlling your other smart home devices. The Amazon Echo Dot (5th Gen) is also equipped with sensors that will detect when someone enters the room, which will allow linked smart lights and smart thermostats to automatically make adjustments.
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