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Trying Out Botkit, Let's Write a Slack Chatbot!

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This English version was translated from my Chinese original with AI assistance.

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Trying Out Botkit, Let's Write a Slack Chatbot!

Goal: build a working Slack chatbot

What you need:

  • A computer with internet access that can run Node.js (I'm using Arch Linux)
  • A Slack team for testing (you can create your own or use an existing one)

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What Is Botkit

Botkit is an open-source chatbot development toolkit. It currently supports platforms like Slack, Facebook Messenger, Cisco Spark, Twilio IP Messaging, and Microsoft Bot Framework.

Botkit's Github link: https://github.com/howdyai/botkit

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Downloading Botkit and Node.js

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Downloading Node.js (only needed if you haven't installed it before)

Node.js is an open-source, cross-platform, lightweight JavaScript runtime, commonly used to build all kinds of web services.

Botkit runs on Node.js, so you have to install Node.js before you can use Botkit.

You can find installation instructions for each platform on the Node.js official website: https://nodejs.org/en/

On Arch Linux, just enter the following command to easily install Node.js with the system's built-in pacman package manager:

sudo pacman -S nodejs npm

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Downloading Botkit

Botkit officially offers two ways to download it: via Git and via npm.

Here we'll use Git, so the example code gets downloaded along with it.

Enter the following command in your terminal:

git clone https://github.com/howdyai/botkit

This downloads botkit into your current directory, including the botkit library and example programs.

Then download the Node.js modules that Botkit needs:

cd botkit/
npm install

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Setting Up Your First Slack Chatbot

Once the download is done, it's time to put a chatbot into your Slack team!

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Slack-side Setup

Open https://my.slack.com/services/new/bot in your browser (replace my with your Slack team's own URL).

This link adds a new chatbot to your Slack team. Enter the name you want to give your bot in the @username field, then click Add bot integration to create it. I named my bot mmbot.

Chatbot created! Next, you'll see an API Token on its settings page. Copy it — you'll need it in the next step.

The chatbot backend program you're about to run needs this token to connect to the Slack bot you just set up.

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Running the Botkit Backend

Finally, let's test with the slack-bot.js example that botkit provides! Run it with the command below, remembering to replace token=your-token with the API Token you just copied:

token=your-token node slack-bot.js

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Done! Say Hi to Your New Bot!

Your new chatbot is all set up! Open Slack and go talk to it!!

The slack-bot.js example supports a few very simple conversations. Try saying these to it:

  • Hello
  • What is your name?
  • Who am I?
  • Call me Eason!