Unanswered

Process Input Text if Multiple Choice Option is not Clicked

(0) Share

Report

Posted on by akashindori1234

I have a multiple choice node.

Is there some way pass the entered text(Activity.Text) under the 'All Other Conditions' branch to the Copilot Studio engine to identity and right triggers and process accordingly if the user does not pick one of the multiple choices but instead decides to enter text for doing something else?

Categories:

Topic creation & management

I have the same question (0)

All responses (9)

Answers (1)

adilei on at

Like (0)

Report

If you allow the question to be interrupted, when a user provides a response which isn't part of the options, an appropriate topic will be triggered by the engine. For example, if your question node allows choosing out of [a,b,c], but your user says "good morning" instead - the greeting topic will be triggered (if interruptions are allowed).

Was this reply helpful? Yes No
akashindori1234 61 on at

Like (0)

Report

Thanks I tried that but after the other topic is triggered, the bot jumps back to prompting for the multiple choice options instead of exiting the multiple choice node.

On an interruption, the user's intention is generally to move on on the from multiple choice and do something else.

I have reprompt set to 'dont repeat' and 'No valid entity found' set to 'set variable to empty'.

The documentation states(see below) abandon the question on interruption but abandoning is not happenning:

Interruptions

Interruptions determines whether the user can switch to a different topic during the question.
Allow switching to another topic: The user can abandon the question for a new topic.

Was this reply helpful? Yes No
akashindori1234 61 on at

Like (0)

Report

One more thing I found out is if in the the topic trigged, I set "startBehavior: CancelOtherTopics" using the code editor, the bot does not jump back to prompting for the multiple choice options again.

Leads me to believe the interrupt is not canceling the topic before triggering the other topic.

Was this reply helpful? Yes No
adilei on at

Like (0)

Report

In the "interrupting topic", use "End all topics" so users will not be directed back to the previous topic.

Was this reply helpful? Yes No
akashindori1234 61 on at

Like (0)

Report

Since I do not know what the interrupting topic will be are you suggesting all topics in the system should "End all Topics" so the user is not directed back? Is this the way the interrupt is supposed to work? I'm reproduciong the copilot studio documentation below, don't you think abandon should work? My sense is abandon does not mean pause and come back and I am not sure if this is a bug or to implement abandon, every topic in the deployment should end all topics.

Interruptions

Interruptions determines whether the user can switch to a different topic during the question.
Allow switching to another topic: The user can abandon the question for a new topic.

Was this reply helpful? Yes No
adilei on at

Like (0)

Report

You can configure the question node so that only selected topics will be allowed to interrupt the question.

As for your broader question: when your question node expects a certain response type (e.g. entities, options), Copilot Studio will manage the conversation in a way that will be biased towards that response. For example, asking again, or returning to the question node that was interrupted. It's necessary in order to respect the intended conversation flow.

If you want to set up a question node that would be agnostic to the response, choose "User's entire response". You can even use a basic card/adaptive card to show options to the end user.

Was this reply helpful? Yes No
akashindori1234 61 on at

Like (0)

Report

Thanks.

So I think the word abandon is misleading in the documentation if you say it is necessary to loop back to the question in order to respect the intended conversation flow.

This is my situation, I want to deploy the chatbot to a public facing website. I have an adaptive card in conversation start for 'Popular Options' that triggers the right topic if an option is clicked. Great so far.

Feedback I am getting is if the site visitor types something in, it triggers the right topic but comes back to the 'Popular Options' card and keep looping till an option in the adaptive card is selected before eventually escalating. Looping under any circumstances makes no sense here.

I tend to agree with the feedback I am getting as valid.

Was this reply helpful? Yes No
Verified answer

adilei on at

Like (2)

Report

Then asking a question with closed options doesn't seem like a good idea. Use a basic card: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-copilot-studio/authoring-send-message#add-a-basic-card

Was this reply helpful? Yes No
akashindori1234 61 on at

Like (1)

Report

Absolutely fabulous, thanks!

Was this reply helpful? Yes No