Defining Responses

Responses go under the responses key in your domain file or in a separate "responses.yml" file. Each response name should start with utter_. For example, you could add responses for greeting and saying goodbye under the response names utter_greet and utter_bye:

intents:
  - greet

responses:
  utter_greet:
  - text: "Hi there!"
  utter_bye:
  - text: "See you!"

If you are using retrieval intents in your assistant, you also need to add responses for your assistant's replies to these intents:

intents:
  - chitchat

responses:
  utter_chitchat/ask_name:
  - text: Oh yeah, I am called the retrieval bot.

utter_chitchat/ask_weather:
  - text: Oh, it does look sunny right now in Berlin.

Using Variables in Responses

You can use variables to insert information into responses. Within a response, a variable is enclosed in curly brackets. For example, see the variable name below:

responses:
  utter_greet:
  - text: "Hey, {name}. How are you?"

When the utter_greet response is used, Rasa automatically fills in the variable with the value found in the slot called name. If such a slot doesn't exist or is empty, the variable gets filled with None.

Another way to fill in a variable is within a custom action. In your custom action code, you can supply values to a response to fill in specific variables. If you're using the Rasa SDK for your action server, you can pass a value for the variable as a keyword argument to dispatcher.utter_message:

dispatcher.utter_message(
    template="utter_greet",
    name="Sara"
)

Response Variations

You can make your assistant's replies more interesting if you provide multiple response variations to choose from for a given response name:

responses:
  utter_greet:
  - text: "Hey, {name}. How are you?"
  - text: "Hey, {name}. How is your day going?"

In this example, when utter_greet gets predicted as the next action, Rasa will randomly pick one of the two response variations to use.

IDs for Responses

New in Rasa 3.6

You can now set an ID for any response. This is useful when you want to use the NLG server to generate the response.

Type for ID is string.

Example of response variations with ID:

responses:
  utter_greet:
  - id: "greet_1"
    text: "Hey, {name}. How are you?"
  - id: "greet_2"
    text: "Hey, {name}. How is your day going?"

Channel-Specific Response Variations

To specify different response variations depending on which channel the user is connected to, use channel-specific response variations.

In the following example, the channel key makes the first response variation channel-specific for the slack channel while the second variation is not channel-specific:

responses:
  utter_ask_game:
  - text: "Which game would you like to play on Slack?"
    channel: "slack"
  - text: "Which game would you like to play?"

Conditional Response Variations

Specific response variations can also be selected based on one or more slot values using a conditional response variation. A conditional response variation is defined in the domain or responses YAML files similarly to a standard response variation but with an additional condition key.

responses:
  utter_greet:
    - condition: slots.prior_visits > 1
      text: "Hey, {name}. Nice to see you again! How are you?"

- condition: not slots.prior_visits
      text: "Welcome. How is your day going?"

Rich Responses

You can make responses rich by adding visual and interactive elements. There are several types of elements that are supported across many channels:

Buttons

You can add buttons to a response to allow the user to select from a list of options.

responses:
  utter_greet:
  - text: "Hey! How are you?"
    buttons:
    - title: "great"
      payload: "/mood_great"
    - title: "super sad"
      payload: "/mood_sad"

Images

You can add images to a response by providing a URL to the image under the image key:

  utter_cheer_up:
  - text: "Here is something to cheer you up:"
    image: "https://i.imgur.com/nGF1K8f.jpg"

Using Responses in Conversations

If the name of the response starts with utter_, the response can directly be used as an action, without being listed in the actions section of your domain. You would add the response to the domain:

responses:
  utter_greet:
  - text: "Hey! How are you?"

You can use that same response as an action in your Flows:

flows:
  Greet:
    name: Greet
    description: This flow is called to greet customers at the start of the conversation.
    steps:
      - action: utter_Greet

If you want to change the text, or any other part of the response, you need to retrain the assistant before these changes will be picked up.