otouto is an independently-developed Telegram API bot written in Lua. Originally conceived as a CLI script in February of 2015, otouto has since been open-sourced and migrated to the API, and is being developed to this day.
You _must_ have Lua (5.2+), luasocket, luasec, and dkjson installed. You should also have lpeg, though it is not required. It is recommended you install these with LuaRocks. To upload photos and other files, you must have curl installed. To use fortune.lua, you must have fortune installed.
When you are ready to start the bot, run `./launch.sh`. To stop the bot, send "/halt" through Telegram. If you terminate the bot manually, you risk data loss. If you do you not want the bot to restart automatically, run it with `lua main.lua`.
Note that certain plugins, such as translate.lua and greetings.lua, will require privacy mode to be disabled. Additionally, some plugins may require or make use of various API keys:
otouto uses a robust plugin system, similar to that of yagop's [Telegram-Bot](http://github.com/yagop/telegram-bot). The aim of the otouto project is to contain any desirable bot feature within one universal bot framework.
Most plugins are intended for public use, but a few are for other purposes, like those used alongside [Liberbot](#liberbot-related-plugins), or for [use by the bot's owner](#control-plugins). See [here](#list-of-plugins) for a list of plugins.
The `bot:on_msg_receive` function adds a few variables to the `msg` table for your convenience. These are self-explanatory: `msg.from.id_str`, `msg.to.id_str`, `msg.chat.id_str`, `msg.text_lower`, `msg.from.name`.
Return values from `plugin:action` are optional, but they do effect the flow. If it returns a table, that table will become `msg`, and `on_msg_receive` will continue with that. If it returns `true`, it will continue with the current `msg`.
When an action or cron function fails, the exception is caught and passed to the `handle_exception` utilty and is either printed to the console or send to the chat/channel defined in `log_chat` in config.lua.
Interactions with the bot API are straightforward. Every binding function shares the name of the API method (eg `sendMessage`). An additional function, `sendReply`, accepts the `msg` table and a string as an argument, and sends the string as a reply to that message.
The administration plugin enables self-hosted, single-realm group administration, supporting both normal groups and supergroups. This works by sending TCP commands to an instance of tg running on the owner's account.
To get started, run `./tg-install.sh`. Note that this script is written for Ubuntu/Debian. If you're running Arch (the only acceptable alternative), you'll have to do it yourself. If that is the case, note that otouto uses the "test" branch of tg, and the AUR package `telegram-cli-git` will not be sufficient, as it does not have support for supergroups yet.
Once the installation is finished, enable `administration.lua` in your config file. **The administration plugin must be loaded before about.lua and blacklist.lua.** You may have reason to change the default TCP port (4567); if that is the case, remember to change it in `tg-launch.sh` as well. Run `./tg-launch.sh` in a separate screen/tmux window. You'll have to enter your phone number and go through the login process the first time. The script is set to restart tg after two seconds, so you'll need to Ctrl+C after exiting.
While tg is running, you may start/reload otouto with administration.lua enabled, and have access to a wide variety of administrative commands and automata. The administration "database" is stored in `administration.json`. To start using otouto to administrate a group (note that you must be the owner (or an administrator)), send `/gadd` to that group. For a list of commands, use `/ahelp`. Below I'll describe various functions now available to you.
antiflood (flag 5) provides a system of automatic flood protection by removing users who post too much. It is entirely configurable by a group's governor, an administrator, or the bot owner. For each message to a particular group, a user is awarded a certain number of "points". The number of points is different for each message type. When the user reaches 100 points, he is removed. Points are reset each minute. In this way, if a user posts twenty messages within one minute, he is removed.
**floodcontrol.lua** makes the bot compliant with Liberbot's floodcontrol function. When the bot has posted too many messages to a single group in a given period of time, Liberbot will send it a message telling it to cease posting in that group. Here is an example floodcontrol command:
Bot output from every plugin should follow a consistent style. This style is easily observed interacting with the bot.
Titles should be either **bold** (along with their colons) or a [link](http://otou.to) (with plaintext colons) to the content's source. Names should be _italic_. Numbered lists should use bold numbers followed by a bold period followed by a space. Unnumbered lists should use the • bullet point followed by a space. Descriptions and information should be in plaintext, although "flavor" text should be italic. Technical information should be `monospace`. Links should be named.
The standard count for plugins which return multiple results is eight results in a private message, and four results elsewhere. This is a trivial number, but consistency is noticeable and desirable.
Everybody is free to contribute to otouto. If you are interested, you are invited to fork the [repo](http://github.com/topkecleon/otouto) and start making pull requests. If you have an idea and you are not sure how to implement it, open an issue or bring it up in the Bot Development group.
The creator and maintainer of otouto is [topkecleon](http://github.com/topkecleon). He can be contacted via [Telegram](http://telegram.me/topkecleon), [Twitter](http://twitter.com/topkecleon), or [email](mailto:drew@otou.to).
There are a a few ways to contribute if you are not a programmer. For one, your feedback is always appreciated. Drop me a line on Telegram or on Twitter. Secondly, we are always looking for new ideas for plugins. Most new plugins start with community input. Feel free to suggest them on Github or in the Bot Dev group. You can also donate Bitcoin to the following address:
Contributions are appreciated in any form. Monetary contributions will go toward server costs. Both programmers and donators will be eternally honored (at their discretion) on this page.
