botica-seed-node-ts

Template project to facilitate implementing, compiling, and building Botica bots in Typescript using npm and botica-lib-node.

Important

If you plan to use Javascript, not Typescript, to develop your bot, use the botica-seed-node template.

1. Initializing the template

You have two main options for setting up your bot project:

1.1. As a subdirectory in an existing Botica project (monorepo)

If you want to create this bot as a subdirectory to an existing Botica project (e.g., alongside your environment.yml file), use the Botica Director's init command:

./botica-director init typescript <your-bot-directory-name>

Replace <your-bot-directory-name> with the desired folder name for your bot's project (e.g., worker-bot). This command will create the project files directly in that subdirectory.

1.2. As a separate repository

If you want to develop this bot in its own dedicated Git repository, click the Use this template button on GitHub to create a new repository based on this one.

2. Preparing your repository

First, modify the package.json file to match your project's details, specifically the name and author properties.

Then, install the project's dependencies using npm. Make sure you have node and npm installed on your machine.

npm install

3. Implementing your bot's logic

Your bot's logic begins by calling the asynchronous botica() function. This returns a Bot instance that you can use to register listeners (bot.on()), define proactive tasks (bot.proactive()), and interact with the Botica environment. Make you sure you start the bot after configuring it, with await bot.start().

You can follow one of these examples for inspiration.

Tip

Full project examples are also available, with their respective Node implementations using TypeScript. Check out botica-infrastructure-fishbowl.

4. Building and running

How you run your bot depends on how you set it up in Step 1.

4.1. If you initialized it as a subdirectory

The Botica Director can automatically build your bot from the source code before starting the environment. You do not need to run any manual build scripts.

In your environment.yml file, use the build property to point to your bot's directory:

bots:
  my-ts-bot:
    # The 'build' property tells the Director to build a Docker image from the
    # project located at the specified relative path before running it.
    build: "./worker-bot"
    replicas: 1
    lifecycle:
      type: reactive

When you run ./botica-director, it will detect the build property, execute the build process defined in the project's Dockerfile, and then launch the container.

4.2. If you are using a separate repository

If you are working in a standalone repository, you need to manually build the Docker image so it is available to your Docker daemon. You can tag it however you like (e.g., my-org/my-bot:latest):

docker build -t my-org/my-bot:latest .

In your environment.yml file, use the image property to reference the tag you just created:

bots:
  my-ts-bot:
    # The 'image' property tells the Director to look for an existing
    # Docker image with this tag.
    image: "my-org/my-bot:latest"
    replicas: 1
    lifecycle:
      type: reactive