Cisco Spark bot for DevNet Create 2017 developer conference

This bot is built with the Cisco Spark adapter from the BotKit framework. It leverages both user-context and conversations from BotKit. It also requests an external Live API to fetch activities in real time. Yo can give it a try by inviting devnetcreate@sparkbot.io to a Cisco Spark space (note that the bot works in both Direct and Group rooms).

New to BotKit? Read the BotKit for CiscoSpark Guide

New to CiscoSpark? Read the Starter Guide we use at hackathon. Or go straight to Spark4Devs, signin and click My apps to create a bot account.

Brought to you by Cisco DevNet and Spark 4 Developers.

The devnetcreate bot at work

Once you have invited the devnetcreate@sparkbot.io to a Cisco Spark space, you get a nice welcome message:

Then type next or @devnetcreate next in a group space to see upcoming activities:

Once you've loaded a few activities, you ready to dig into details with the about command which illustrates a conversation with BotKit, as you can type those commands in 2 steps. First type about:

then type 2 for example:

Note that you can also type about 2 but then it is not a conversation you'll be initiating but simply a command (technically speaking).

As it is a 2 steps conversation you're having, you'll need to type cancel if you don't want to proceed and see details.

Installation

Assuming your bot is accessible from the internet or you expose it via ngrok; you can run any sample in a snatch:

From a bash shell, type:

> git clone https://github.com/CiscoDevNet/devnetcreate-bot
> cd devnetcreate-bot
> npm install
> SPARK_TOKEN=0123456789abcdef PUBLIC_URL=https://abcdef.ngrok.io SECRET="not that secret" node bot.js

From a windows shell, type:

> git clone https://github.com/CiscoDevNet/devnetcreate-bot
> cd devnetcreate-bot
> npm install
> set SPARK_TOKEN="0123456789abcdef"
> set PUBLIC_URL="https://abcdef.ngrok.io"
> set SECRET="not that secret"
> node bot.js

where:

• SPARK_TOKEN is the API access token of your Cisco Spark bot
• PUBLIC_URL is the root URL at which Cisco Spark can reach your bot
• SECRET is the secret that Cisco Spark uses to sign the JSON webhooks events posted to your bot
• ngrok helps you expose the bot running on your laptop to the internet, type: ngrok http 8080 to launch