- TL;DR
- Essentials First
- From DevOps to BotOps
- Deep dive into the GitHub Actions Configuration
-
Steps to Configure Your Pipedream Workflow
- Step 1. Command Reception : Set up a trigger for Telegram bot commands.
- Step 2. GitHub Interaction : Automate file updates in your repository.
- Step 3. Delay for Action Completion : Ensure synchronization with GitHub Actions.
- Step 4. Results Retrieval : Fetch the solved puzzle from the repository.
- Step 5. Notification : Inform the user about the solution directly through Telegram.
- Conclusion
- Get the Source Code
- What To Do Next
TL;DR
Telegram isn’t just for sending and receiving chat messages. It’s also for automating your dialog flow, including workflow.
Using a Telegram Bot gives you the ability to check prices, query status, solve puzzles, and even have a fun conversation.
And if you’re a serious developer or engineer, you can create your own Telegram Bot to manage your servers, view user details, and open or close issues.
GitHub-Actions-Telegram-Bot is a Telegram bot that allow you to communicate with a GitHub Actions pipeline that may return an output message.
Essentials First
Gear up by setting up accounts on (no credit card required):
- Telegram for instant messaging automation.
- GitHub for repository management and actions.
- Pipedream for connecting apps and automating workflows.
Crafting Your Telegram Bot
My previous article Building a Telegram Chat with a MT4 Forex Trading Expert Advisor contains a prerequisite tutorial on How to Create a New Telegram Bot.
It’s a goldmine for those into crypto or forex trading too.
From DevOps to BotOps
GitHub Actions, a powerhouse for CI/CD, lets you automate builds, tests, and deployments. Integrating it with a Telegram Bot creates a dynamic duo for automating workflows beyond the traditional scope.
A typical workflow for a CI/CD pipeline is to make some changes to your repository files, then add and commit these file changes. The pipeline may trigger on a push
, or any event types, that you have defined in a GitHub Actions config file.
We can extend this CI/CD pipeline by creating a webhook that listens for a Telegram bot command to start a chain of events, which includes automating the CI/CD pipeline. The result of the pipeline may then be returned to the Telegram bot.
In this article, you’ll have a bit of fun by creating a Telegram Bot to automate solving a sudoku puzzle and returning the result.
You’ll send a command (prefix with a /
) to the Telegram Bot. For example:
/solve PUZZLE_STRING
This triggers a chain of events, which includes automating the GitHub Actions pipeline, and the result is a text message reply that contains the solved puzzle.
Deep dive into the GitHub Actions Configuration
TL;DR: You can fork the source code from my GitHub repository for a head start.
Before diving into configuring the workflow, let’s take a peek at how the GitHub Actions configuration works.
To create a GitHub Actions pipeline, we have to specify:
- Name of the GitHub Actions
name
. - Type of trigger events
on
. - An array of jobs
jobs
.- A base image
runs-on
. - An array of steps
steps
. - Checkout git repo.
- Set up Python.
- Install dependencies.
- Run tests.
- Run application.
- A base image
Let’s look at an example.
We name the GitHub Actions Python application
, and it will trigger on each push
to the master
branch.
There is one job build
using the base image ubuntu-latest
that runs each of the steps listed above.
- The first step checks out the git repository, with a minimum commit history of
fetch-depth
. - The second and third steps install
Python 3.9
and the dependencies inrequirements.txt
. - The fourth and fifth steps run the unit tests and application.
For the final step, the command sudoku
reads the file examples/puzzle.txt
containing a PUZZLE_STRING. The return output string is then piped through a series of formatting commands using sed
and awk
and into the file examples/result.txt
. The result.txt
file is compared to the last commit and a new commit is created only if there is a change in the file.
Steps to Configure Your Pipedream Workflow
TL;DR: You can copy the configuration from my Pipedream workflow for swift integration.
In order to create a webhook that listens for your Telegram bot commands, and starts a chain of events, which includes automating the CI/CD pipeline, you’ll need to create a workflow in Pipedream.
At a helicopter view, the steps to configure are as follows:
- Step 1. Command Reception : Set up a trigger for Telegram bot commands.
- Step 2. GitHub Interaction : Automate file updates in your repository.
- Step 3. Delay for Action Completion : Ensure synchronization with GitHub Actions.
- Step 4. Results Retrieval : Fetch the solved puzzle from the repository.
- Step 5. Notification : Inform the user about the solution directly through Telegram.
Your TELEGRAM_BOT_TOKEN that you created in the previous section will come in handy here.
- Navigate to your Pipedream dashboard > Projects.
- Click New Project, and name the project Telegram-Bot.
- Click Save, and your project should appear under Projects.
- Click on your project name, navigate to Resources.
- Click on New > Workflow, and name the workflow Sudoku-Actions.
- Click Create Workflow, and your workflow should appear under Resources.
Step 1. Command Reception : Set up a trigger for Telegram bot commands.
Now that you have created a workflow, let’s create a trigger.
- Click on your workflow name, and search for Telegram app.
- Select Telegram Bot > New Bot Command Received (Instant).
- In the Telegram Bot Account, select Connect new account.
- In token, enter your TELEGRAM_BOT_TOKEN.
- In nickname, enter your Telegram bot name.
- Click Save, and your telegram bot should appear under Telegram Bot Account.
- Select Commands > and select one or more commands.
Now to test your first action, open your Telegram app and send a command from your Telegram bot. For example:
/solve 600009130700000090209500004926345000800006340473001000197004603302007000508900007
Step 2. GitHub Interaction : Automate file updates in your repository.
Now that you have created a trigger, let’s create some actions.
- Click on the + icon (below your trigger), and search for GitHub app.
- Select GitHub app, and search for file contents.
- Select Create or update file contents.
- In the GitHub Account, select Connect new account.
- Follow the steps to connect your GitHub account.
- Click Save, and your account should appear under GitHub Account.
- Click Repository, search for and select sudoku-cli.
- In Path, enter
examples/puzzle.txt
. - In File content, enter
{{steps.code.puzzle}}
.
Step 3. Delay for Action Completion : Ensure synchronization with GitHub Actions.
As the GitHub Actions pipeline may take some time to execute, you will need to set a fixed period of delay in your workflow.
- Click on the + icon (below your previous), and search for Workflow delay app.
- Select Worflow delay app.
- In Duration to delay (value), enter
35
. - In Duration to delay (unit), enter
seconds
.
Step 4. Results Retrieval : Fetch the solved puzzle from the repository.
The next step is to get the result from the repository.
- Click on the + icon (below your trigger), and search for GitHub app.
- Select GitHub app, and search for get repository.
- Select Get repository content.
- Click Repository, search for and select sudoku-cli.
- In Path, enter
examples/result.txt
.
Step 5. Notification : Inform the user about the solution directly through Telegram.
The final step is to send a text message to your Telegram bot.
- Click on the + icon (below your trigger), and search for Telegram app.
- Select Telegram app, and search for send text.
- Select Send text message or reply.
- Click Telegram Bot Account, search for and select sudokuclibot.
- In Path, enter
{{steps.trigger.event.message.chat.id}}
. - In Text, enter
{{steps.base64_decode_string.data}}
.
Conclusion
In this article, you created a GitHub Actions to run a Python application sudoku
that accepts a file containing a PUZZLE_STRING, and returns the result in an output file result.txt
. You then created a Pipedream workflow that listens to your Telegram Bot for a given command /solve PUZZLE_STRING
that starts a chain of events, which includes automating the CI/CD pipeline. The workflow then replies to your Telegram Bot with the contents of the file result.txt
.
By creating a bot that automates tasks and streamlines workflows, you’ve taken a significant step towards adopting modern DevOps practices.
Get the Source Code
You can copy the above configuration from my Pipedream workflow Telegram Bot > Sudoku-Actions.
You can download the above source code from my GitHub repository dennislwm/sudoku-cli.
What To Do Next
You can elevate your bot’s capabilities by:
- Minimizing Wait Times : Streamline results delivery by integrating direct feedback mechanisms from GitHub Actions to your Telegram bot.
- Expanding Functionality : You can enrich your bot with new commands for diverse tasks, such as transcribe a YouTube video, check next T-Bills auction dates, etc.
Embrace this journey to automate and innovate, shaping the future of how we interact with technology.
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