This section details how you can set up your Digital Person to use the action-based conversations created using the new Watson Assistant, by IBM. 

Note: Currently our support is limited to new Watson Assistant’s action based conversations.

Before you begin

1. Create an action based conversation using IBM’s new Watson Assistant. Refer to IBM Cloud Docs to learn about action-based conversations and how to build them. 

2. Obtain the API KEY, SERVICE URL, and ENVIRONMENT ID access credentials to connect to your new Watson Assistant.

Access credentials 

From the IBM Watson workspace navigate to the resource you are looking to connect to Digital DNA Studio. The API Key and URL can be found on the Manage tab.

In Soul Machines Studio, only the base URL needs to be entered. i.e. https://api.au-syd.assistant.watson.cloud.ibm.com from the below instance.

The ENVIRONMENT ID can be found on Environment Settings > API details in the New Assistant Dashboard:

Connecting New Watson Assistant to your Digital Person

Choose New Watson Assistant from the Manage Conversations and Skills section of Digital DNA Studio. Refer to Getting Started | Connect conversation and add skills for detailed instructions on adding an NLP and skills to your project.

Configuring the welcome intent

The new Watson Assistant does not have a 'Welcome' intent by default, so you must add a welcome message as a training phrase in one of the actions.

If the ‘MY DIGITAL PERSON SHOULD GREET ME AT START’ is enabled in Digital DNA studio, an Action with the ‘Welcome’ intent needs to be added. Otherwise, the Digital Person will respond with a Fallback answer on startup/initiation. It is recommended to not use validation in the first(welcome) node of the conversation.

Limitations

Currently, in the new Watson Assistant Skill, there is NO support for:

• IBM Watson’s Dialog Skill. 

It is recommended to not activate Dialogs when developing using Actions. As Dialogs can override Actions and this skill is developed to support New Watson Actions.

• Mark up language in text.
  So for example, if a word in the word, ‘first name’ in the text was bold, the Digital Person would read it as * * first name * * (asterisk asterisk first name asterisk asterisk).