Telegram

You first have to create a Telegram bot to get credentials. Once you have them you can add these to your credentials.yml.

Getting Credentials

How to get the Telegram credentials: You need to set up a Telegram bot.

1. To create the bot, go to Bot Father, enter /newbot and follow the instructions. The URL that Telegram should send messages to will look like http://<host>:<port>/webhooks/telegram/webhook, replacing the host and port with the appropriate values from your running Rasa server.

2. At the end you should get your access_token and the username you set will be your verify.

3. If you want to use your bot in a group setting, it's advisable to turn on group privacy mode by entering /setprivacy. Then the bot will only listen when a user's message starts with /bot.

For more information, check out the Telegram HTTP API.

Running on Telegram

Add the Telegram credentials to your credentials.yml:

telegram:
  access_token: "490161424:AAGlRxinBRtKGb21_rlOEMtDFZMXBl6EC0o"
  verify: "your_bot"
  webhook_url: "https://your_url.com/webhooks/telegram/webhook"

Restart your Rasa server to make the new channel endpoint available for Telegram to send messages to.

Handling /start message

At the beginning of a conversation, the user will press the 'Start' button in Telegram. This will trigger a message with the content /start to be sent. Make sure your bot can handle this intro message by designing a specific intent in the nlu training data file. Then add this start intent to the domain alongside a story or rule to handle it.

Supported Response Attachments

In addition to standard text: responses, this channel also supports the following components from the Telegram API:

• button arguments:
  • button_type: inline | vertical | reply
• custom arguments:
  • photo
  • audio
  • document
  • sticker
  • video
  • video_note
  • animation
  • voice
  • media
  • latitude, longitude (location)
  • latitude, longitude, title, address (venue)
  • phone_number
  • game_short_name
  • action

Examples:

  utter_ask_transfer_form_confirm:
  - buttons:
    - payload: /affirm
      title: Yes
    - payload: /deny
      title: No, cancel the transaction
    button_type: vertical
    text: Would you like to transfer {currency}{amount_of_money} to {PERSON}?
    image: "https://i.imgur.com/nGF1K8f.jpg"

  utter_giraffe_sticker:
  - text: Here's my giraffe sticker!
    custom:
      sticker: "https://github.com/TelegramBots/book/raw/master/src/docs/sticker-fred.webp"