PHP Telegram Bot

======================

A Telegram Bot based on the official Telegram Bot API

introduction

This is a pure php Telegram Bot, fully extensible via plugins. Telegram recently announced official support for a Bot API allowing integrators of all sorts to bring automated interactions to the mobile platform. This Bot aims to provide a platform where one could simply write a plugin and have interactions in a matter of minutes. The Bot support Reply Markup and handle commands in group chat.

Instructions

1. Message @botfather https://telegram.me/botfather with the following text: /newbot If you don't know how to message by username, click the search field on your Telegram app and type @botfather, you should be able to initiate a conversation. Be careful not to send it to the wrong contact, because some users has similar usernames to botfather.

   

2. @botfather replies with Alright, a new bot. How are we going to call it? Please choose a name for your bot.

3. Type whatever name you want for your bot.

4. @botfather replies with Good. Now let's choose a username for your bot. It must end in bot. Like this, for example: TetrisBot or tetris_bot.

5. Type whatever username you want for your bot, minimum 5 characters, and must end with bot. For example: telesample_bot

6. @botfather replies with:

   Done! Congratulations on your new bot. You will find it at telegram.me/telesample_bot. You can now add a description, about section and profile picture for your bot, see /help for a list of commands.

   Use this token to access the HTTP API: 123456789:AAG90e14-0f8-40183D-18491dDE

   For a description of the Bot API, see this page: https://core.telegram.org/bots/api

7. Note down the 'token' mentioned above.

8. Type /setprivacy to @botfather.

   

9. @botfather replies with Choose a bot to change group messages settings.

10. Type @telesample_bot (change to the username you set at step 5 above, but start it with @)

11. @botfather replies with

    'Enable' - your bot will only receive messages that either start with the '/' symbol or mention the bot by username. 'Disable' - your bot will receive all messages that people send to groups. Current status is: ENABLED

12. Type Disable to let your bot receive all messages sent to a group. This step is up to you actually.

13. @botfather replies with Success! The new status is: DISABLED. /help

Installation

You need server with https and composer support.

Install this package through Composer. Edit your project's composer.json file to require longman/telegram-bot.

Create composer.json file:

{
    "name": "yourproject/yourproject",
    "type": "project",
    "require": {
        "php": ">=5.4.0",
        "longman/telegram-bot": "*"
    }
}

And run composer update

Or run a command in your command line:

composer require longman/telegram-bot

bot token

You will notice that the Telegram Bot wants a value for API_KEY. This token may be obtained via a telegram client for your bot. See this link if you are unsure of how to so this.

Usage

You must set WebHook

Create set.php and put:

<?php

$loader = require __DIR__.'/vendor/autoload.php';

$API_KEY = 'your_bot_api_key';
$BOT_NAME = 'namebot';

try {
    // create Telegram API object
    $telegram = new Longman\TelegramBot\Telegram($API_KEY, $BOT_NAME);

    // set webhook
    echo $telegram->setWebHook('https://yourdomain/yourpath_to_hook.php');
} catch (Longman\TelegramBot\Exception\TelegramException $e) {
    echo $e->getMessage();
}

And open your set.php via browser

After create hook.php and put:

<?php

$loader = require __DIR__.'/vendor/autoload.php';

$API_KEY = 'your_bot_api_key';
$BOT_NAME = 'namebot';

try {
    // create Telegram API object
    $telegram = new Longman\TelegramBot\Telegram($API_KEY,$BOT_NAME);

    // here you can set some command specified parameters, for example, google geocode/timezone api key for date command:
    $telegram->setCommandConfig('date', array('google_api_key'=>'your_google_api_key_here'));

    // handle telegram webhook request
    $telegram->handle();
} catch (Longman\TelegramBot\Exception\TelegramException $e) {
    // log telegram errors
    // echo $e->getMessage();
}

If you want insert in database messages/users for further usage in commands, create database and import structure.sql and enable mysql support after object creation and BEFORE handle method

<?php

$credentials = array('host'=>'localhost', 'user'=>'dbuser', 'password'=>'dbpass', 'database'=>'dbname');

$telegram->enableMySQL($credentials);

Utilis

Maybe you would like to develop your own commands. A good practice is to store them outside vendor/. This can be done adding before the method:

$COMMANDS_FOLDER = __DIR__.'/Commands/';
$telegram->addCommandsPath($COMMANDS_FOLDER);

You can also log incoming messages on a text file, set this option with the methods:

    $telegram->setLogRequests(true);
    $telegram->setLogPath($BOT_NAME.'.log');

This code is available on Github. Pull requests are welcome.

Troubleshooting

If you like living on the edge, please report any bugs you find on the PHP Telegram Bot issues page.

Contributing

See CONTRIBUTING.md for information.

Credits

Created by Avtandil Kikabidze.