Writing chatbots on Obyte

Last updated 6 days ago
Chatbots communicate with users and offer various services. These services are usually connected with payments.
Prerequisites
To run a chatbot, you need to setup a headless node first. Headless nodes are full nodes by default. A subset of the functionality might work in light nodes too, but keep in mind that it was designed for full nodes only.
Create a new node.js package for your bot. You will definitely need modules from ocore(add it to your project's dependencies) and if you are going to send payments, you will also need headless-obyte. Your package.json should list these dependencies:
package.json
"dependencies": {
	"headless-obyte": "git+https://github.com/byteball/headless-obyte.git",
	"ocore": "^0.2.33",
	.....
}
In your module, require() wallet.js even if you are not using any of its functions (it handles messages from the hub):
require('ocore/wallet.js');
Configuration
In your configuration file (conf.js in project folder or conf.json in user folder) specify your bot name and a pairing secret that will be part of your pairing code:
conf.js
exports.deviceName = 'My test bot';
exports.permanent_pairing_secret = '0000';
When you start your node, it will print its full pairing code:
====== my pairing code: A2WMb6JEIrMhxVk+I0gIIW1vmM3ToKoLkNF8TqUV5UvX@byteball.org/bb#0000
The pairing code consists of your node's public key (device public key), hub address, and pairing secret (after #).
Publish this pairing code on your website as a link with byteball: scheme, users will be able to open a chat with your bot by clicking your link (the link opens in their Obyte app and starts a chat):
<a href="byteball:A2WMb6JEIrMhxVk+I0gIIW1vmM3ToKoLkNF8TqUV5UvX@byteball.org/bb#0000">Chat with my test bot</a>
You also need this pairing code to add your bot to the Bot Store.
Light node
Some bots don't need to sync full node. If your bot is designed to work as light node or you just wish to get it working first, change bLight variable to true in configuration file. Changing this value will make it use different SQLite database next time you run it.
conf.js
exports.bLight = true;
Testnet
Run cp .env.testnet .env to connect to TESTNET hub. Backup and delete the database if you already ran it on MAINNET. Wallet app for TESTNET can be downloaded from Obyte.org website.
Email notifications
Most bots out there expect user's machine to have UNIX sendmail and by default sendmail function in mail module will try to use that, but it is possible to configure your node to use SMTP relay. This way you could use Gmail or Sendmail SMTP server or even something like Mailtrap.io (excellent for testing purposes if you don't want the actual email recipient to receive your test messages). This is how the configuration would look:
conf.json
{
	"smtpTransport": "relay",
	"smtpRelay": "smtp.mailtrap.io",
	"smtpUser": "MAILTRAP_INBOX_USER",
	"smtpPassword": "MAILTRAP_INBOX_PASSWORD",
	"smtpSsl": false,
	"smtpPort": 2525,
	"admin_email": "admin@example.com",
	"from_email": "bot@example.com"
}
SQL Database
If you need to inspect the DAG (most likely, you need) and see the details of any transaction, require the db module
var db = require('ocore/db.js');
and run any SQL queries on your copy of the Obyte database (sqlite file is located in same folder as configuration). You can also add your custom tables. Obviously, you don't want to modify any data outside your custom tables.
Obyte nodes will use sqlite database by default because it needs zero configuration, but it is possible to use MySQL or MariaDB too with a configuration like this:
conf.json
{
	"storage": "mysql",
	"database": {
		"host"     : "localhost",
		"user"     : "DATABASE_USER",
		"password" : "DATABASE_PASSWORD",
		"name"     : "DATABASE_NAME"
	}
}
Receiving pairing notifications
When a user pairs his device with your bot (e.g. by clicking the link to your bot), you receive a pairing notification and can welcome the user:
eventBus.on('paired', function(from_address, pairing_secret){
	var device = require('ocore/device.js');
	device.sendMessageToDevice(from_address, 'text', 'Hi! I am bot.');
});
The behavior of your event handler can depend on pairing_secret, the second argument of the event handler. For example, you can have a one-time (non-permanent) pairing secret equal to session ID on your website; after the user clicks the pairing link and opens chat, you can link his chat session with his web session, see Authenticating users on websites.
Accept any pairing secret
If you wish to accept any pairing secret then you can do that by changing the pairing secret row in  configuration file into this:
conf.js
exports.permanent_pairing_secret = '*';
Receiving chat messages
To receive chat messages, subscribe to 'text' events on event bus:
var eventBus = require('ocore/event_bus.js');
eventBus.on('text', function(from_address, user_message){
    // your code here
});
from_address is user's device address (not to be confused with payment addresses), user_message is their message.
Sending chat messages
Messages to user's device can be sent with sendMessageToDevice function in device module:
var device = require('ocore/device.js');
device.sendMessageToDevice(user_device_address, 'text', 'Message from bot to user');
So, in case we want to echo back what user wrote, we could combine those two above examples into this:
var eventBus = require('ocore/event_bus.js');
eventBus.on('text', function(from_address, user_message){
    var device = require('ocore/device.js');
    device.sendMessageToDevice(from_address, 'text', user_message);
});
Great success, we now have a bot, which is like a parrot (repeating everything you wrote to it).
Predefined chat commands
To give access to predefined commands, format your responses this way:
click this link: [Command name](command:command code)
The user will see the text in square brackets "Command name", it will be highlighted as a link, and when the user clicks it, his app will send command code text to your bot.
Command suggestion
Sometimes you might want to suggest the command without actually sending it immediately, so user could have the possibility to edit the command before sending, this could be done like this:
Example command: we suggest to [buy (number) apples](suggest-command:buy 5 apples)
Payments
One of the core features that almost every existing Obyte chatbot has is sending and receiving payments. This enables bot developers immediately add payment to the service they could be providing without the need for any other third-party payment processor.
Requesting payments
When you include a valid Obyte address anywhere in the text of your response to the user, the address will be automatically highlighted in the user's chat window, and after clicking it the user will be able to pay arbitrary amount of arbitrary asset to this address.
When you want to request a specific amount of a specific asset, format your payment request this way:
Any text before [payment description, will be ignored](byteball:YOUR_WALLET_ADDRESS?amount=123000&asset=base) any text after
Amount is in the smallest units, such as bytes. If you omit &asset=... part, base asset (bytes) is assumed. If you want to request payment in another asset, indicate its identifier such as oj8yEksX9Ubq7lLc+p6F2uyHUuynugeVq4+ikT67X6E= for blackbytes (don't forget to url-encode it).
You will likely want to generate a unique payment address per user, per transaction. This code sample might help:
var walletDefinedByKeys = require('ocore/wallet_defined_by_keys.js');
walletDefinedByKeys.issueNextAddress(wallet, 0, function(objAddress){
	var wallet_address = objAddress.address;
	// work with this address, then send it over to the user
	device.sendMessageToDevice(user_device_address, 'text', "Please pay to "+wallet_address);
});
Waiting for payments
If you include a headless wallet
var headlessWallet = require('headless-obyte');
you can get notified when any of your addresses receives a payment
eventBus.on('new_my_transactions', function(arrUnits){
	// react to receipt of payment(s)
});
arrUnits is an array of units (more accurately, unit hashes) that contained any transaction involving your addresses. The event new_my_transactions is triggered for outgoing transactions too, you should check if the new transaction credits one of the addresses you are expecting payments to.
Waiting for finality of payments
To get notified when any of your transactions become stable (confirmed), subscribe to my_transactions_became_stable event:
eventBus.on('my_transactions_became_stable', function(arrUnits){
	// react to payment(s) becoming stable
});
arrUnits is again the array of units that just became stable and they contained at least one transaction involving your addresses.
The above events work in both full and light nodes. If your node is full, you can alternatively subscribe to event mci_became_stable which is emitted each time a new main chain index (MCI) becomes stable:
eventBus.on('mci_became_stable', function(mci){
	// check if there are any units you are interested in 
	// that had this MCI and react to their becoming stable
});
Sending payments
To send payments, you need to include a headless wallet
var headlessWallet = require('headless-obyte');
and use this function:
headlessWallet.issueChangeAddressAndSendPayment(asset, amount, user_wallet_address, user_device_address, function(err, unit){
	if (err){
		// something went wrong, maybe put this payment on a retry queue
		return;
	}
	// handle successful payment
});
asset is the asset you are paying in (null for bytes), amount is payment amount in the smallest units. If the payment was successful, you get its unit in the callback and can save it or watch further events on this unit.
There are many other functions for sending payments, for example sending multiple payments in multiple assets at the same time, see exports of https://github.com/byteball/headless-obyte/blob/master/start.js.
Sending data to DAG database
To send data to DAG database, code below is a minimal that you can use. In case when you want to send data or text from specific address, you will need to look into links to other code examples below.
var headlessWallet = require('headless-obyte');
var eventBus = require('ocore/event_bus.js');
var objectHash = require('ocore/object_hash.js');
​
eventBus.on('headless_wallet_ready', () => {
	var json_data = {
		foo: 'bar'
	};
	var objMessage = {
		app: 'data',
		payload_location: 'inline',
		payload_hash: objectHash.getBase64Hash(json_data),
		payload: json_data
	};
	var opts = {
		messages: [objMessage]
	};
​
	​headlessWallet.sendMultiPayment(opts, function(err, unit){
		if (err){
			// something went wrong, maybe put this transaction on a retry queue
			return;
		}
		// handle successful payment
	});
});
Besides data, there are other types of message apps too, like data_feed, attestation, profile , poll and text. Code examples for these are available in "/play" folder of headless-wallet.
If you wish to send data to DAG database periodically then full code examples for price oracle, bitcoin oracle or sports oracle can be found on Github.
Offering smart contracts
When you want to create a new smart contract with a user, your sequence is usually as follows:
you ask the user to send his payment address (it will be included in the contract)
you define a new contract using the user's address and your address as parties of the contract
you pay your share to the contract
at the same time, you send a specially formatted payment request (different from the payment request above) to the user to request his share. You start waiting for the user's payment
the user views the contract definition in his wallet and agrees to pay
you receive the payment notification and wait for it to get confirmed
after the payment is confirmed, the contract is fully funded
Most steps are already familiar, we'll discuss creating and offering contracts below. These two steps are similar to what happens in the GUI wallet when a user designs a new contract.
Creating contract definition
Create a JSON object that defines the contract:
var arrDefinition = ['or', [
	['and', [
		['address', USERADDRESS],
		conditions when user can unlock the contract
	]],
	['and', [
		['address', MYADDRESS],
		conditions when I can unlock the contract
	]]
]];
Create another object that describes the positions of your and user addresses in the above definition:
var device = require('ocore/device.js');
var assocSignersByPath = {
	'r.0.0': {
		address: user_address,
		member_signing_path: 'r', // unused, should be always 'r'
		device_address: user_device_address
	},
	'r.1.0': {
		address: my_address,
		member_signing_path: 'r', // unused, should be always 'r'
		device_address: device.getMyDeviceAddress()
	}
};
The keys of this object are r (from "root") followed by indexes into arrays in the definition's orand and conditions. Since the conditions can be nested, there can be many indexes, they are separated by dot.
Then you create the smart contract address:
var walletDefinedByAddresses = require('ocore/wallet_defined_by_addresses.js');
walletDefinedByAddresses.createNewSharedAddress(arrDefinition, assocSignersByPath, {
	ifError: function(err){
		// handle error
	},
	ifOk: function(shared_address){
		// new shared address created
	}
});
If the address was successfully created, it was also already automatically sent to the user, so the user's wallet will know it.
More definition examples can be seen on smart contracts definitions page.
Sending a request for contract payment
To request the user to pay his share to the contract, create the below javascript object objPaymentRequest which contains both the payment request and the definition of the contract, encode the object in base64, and send it over to the user:
var arrPayments = [{address: shared_address, amount: peer_amount, asset: peerAsset}];
var assocDefinitions = {};
assocDefinitions[shared_address] = {
	definition: arrDefinition,
	signers: assocSignersByPath
};
var objPaymentRequest = {payments: arrPayments, definitions: assocDefinitions};
var paymentJson = JSON.stringify(objPaymentRequest);
var paymentJsonBase64 = Buffer(paymentJson).toString('base64');
var paymentRequestCode = 'payment:'+paymentJsonBase64;
var paymentRequestText = '[your share of payment to the contract]('+paymentRequestCode+')';
device.sendMessageToDevice(correspondent.device_address, 'text', paymentRequestText);
The user's wallet will parse this message, display the definition of the contract in a user readable form, and offer the user to pay the requested amount. Your payment-waiting code will be called when the payment is seen on the DAG.
Code samples
For working samples of code that implements the above functions, see the source code of existing chatbots:
​Bot example: start from here
​Faucet: sending payments
​ICO bot: sending and receiving payments
​Merchant: receiving payments without storage of private keys
​Flight delay insurance: offering contracts
​Internal asset exchange: offering contracts
​GUI wallet: not a bot, but you'll find code for offering contracts
Introduction
Setting up headless wallet