Installation

The easiest way to get started is using the bots script.

Note

We strongly recommend using a virtual environment to avoid package conflicts. virtualenv -p python3 bot_env/ && source bot_env/bin/activate

First, install Botshot and dependencies from PyPI.
pip3 install botshot

You will also need to install and start the Redis database. On Ubuntu, run:
sudo apt install redis-server

Now go ahead and run:
bots init my_bot
This will bootstrap a chatbot with default configuration under my_bot/.

Running the chatbot

First, cd to the chatbot directory you just created.
cd my_bot
You can now run the chatbot with
bots start.

The web chat interface should now be running at http://127.0.0.1:8000/ .
Go ahead and trying sending a message to your chatbot!

Windows support

Install Botshot on Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL). This was tested on Windows 10 1903 build. Follow the [instalation guide](https://docs.microsoft.com/cs-cz/windows/wsl/install-win10) if you haven’t installed WSL yet.

Running Botshot on Windows natively is not supported yet.

Running from IDE (optional)

In case you’re using an IDE such as PyCharm for development, it might be more convenient to run the chatbot from within it, for example to make use of the debugger.

You will need to manually start the required components:

  • Django server

    Under Edit configurations > Add configuration > Django server

  • Celery tasks
    Under Edit configurations > Add configuration > Python
    Script path: path to celery - bot_env/bin/celery
    Working directory: chatbot root
  • Redis database
    You can either run redis-server from the terminal or with an init script, as you would any other database.
    If you’re on Ubuntu and have installed redis with apt install redis, it should already be running.
    You can connect to your database using redis-cli.