Vitrual Agent - return to "Anything else" after topic completes

[Bernard Esterhu]

I am testing the Virtual Agent to better understand the flows. 

I have configured my own custom Greeting setup topic, that redirects to a topic I created. I have also configured my "Anything else" setup topic for testing. 

What I expect to happen is that my Greeting topic is launched, it redirects to my custom topic, and when that topic ends, the VA is directed to "Anything else". However, the VA just stops at the end of my custom topic. 

Is my understanding that "Anything else" is called whenever a topic reaches the "End" position incorrect? I need some default action/topic whenever any of my topics reached the "End" position.

Greeting

Custom topic:

[Mark Roethof]

Hi there,

It depends what method you actually used for the redirect. Can you share that?

[Chris D]

Just to confirm, if you're not using the ootb topic picker and NLU (as is apparent), to switch topics, you should be using vaSystem.switchTopicById(sysid). 

As far as the main question...

> Is my understanding that "Anything else" is called whenever a topic reaches the "End" position incorrect?

No, that is correct. You need to have the Anything else Setup Topic set though - so go to Conversational Interfaces > Settings > Virtual Agent > Custom Greetings & Setup > Default Chat Experience* > Anything Else and make sure that's set with your preferred topic:
*you can technically have different ones, but most likely you're using the default and that's perfectly ok

[Bernard Esterhu]

Thanks for the responses @Chris D and @Mark Roethof 

I was using the method vaSystem.switchTopic(). I changed this to vaSystem.switchTopicById(), but I'm still getting the same result - no redirection to "Anything Else" once End of the Custom topic has been reached.

If I use the topic picker and NLU, I do get redirected to Anything Else.

[Lynda1]

VA is waiting for User Input, something needs to be typed at that point or it never ends. Since User input is there, I am hoping that component is using NLU so the VA can find the appropriate topic.