O> AI Bot Development

[kitblake]

Various Activists are investigating bots that could play a useful role in Slack and other contexts. It's an 'emerging property project'. There is no overriding goal, just exploration. At this point work is being done on a Knowledge Base and there's a working proof of concept of a Welcome Bot.

There's enormous potential in the bot space. We expect to develop some beneficent entities. If you're interested please join the discussion and contribute.

[kitblake]

There is a test Slack which mimics the RChain Slack located at: https://rchain-ai.slack.com/ Development and testing happen here. Invite link: https://join.slack.com/t/rchain-ai/shared_invite/MjE5MjU5MzEzMDczLTE1MDE0ODk1MDYtMzJiMzkzNTE5MA (Expires on August 30th, ping for a new one)

[jimscarver]

I added the script https://github.com/rchain/Members/blob/master/rchainwelcome.php where you can add channel welcome messages. These can later be stored in the mysql db and interfaced with a /welcome message command in a channel.

[kitblake]

Script updated.

[jimscarver]

update installed. on divvydao.org

[kitblake]

To join the Slack test instance for AI Bot Dev use this invite link: https://join.slack.com/t/rchain-ai/shared_invite/MjE5MjU5MzEzMDczLTE1MDE0ODk1MDYtMzJiMzkzNTE5MA (Expires on August 30th, ping for a new one)

[kitblake]

There's a bug in the script where the user's name is not being returned. I think it's in line 35, where: echo "name=$name\n\n"; should be: echo "user=$user\n\n"; I've changed this and it's checked in. If I'm wrong then we need to figure out why $user is not showing up in the welcome message.

[jimscarver]

echo "name=$name\n\n"; just outputs the quoted text after substituting the value of name for when I test from the command line.. The correct name of the user is output for $name. The value $user was never assigned by the script so use $name instead of $user in your channel joined slackbot messages. I am making the update in production.

[kitblake]

The idea for the Welcome Bot was to foster onboarding by sending new Slack users a DM with links to Activist resources and the registration form. But Slack auto-joins new users to the #general and #random channels without triggering an event signal, so it seemed like there was no way to send that onboarding message. There is an event when a user joins a channel and we've focused on sending custom welcome messages for specific channels. It's working in the shadowslack.

But now, due to the RChain Slack hitting the 10,000 message limit, we have a synchronistic solution. The #general channel has been limited and will be used for announcements only. The #community channel replaces it. New slack users will still be auto-joined to #general by default, but not #community. Thus IF a user joins #community, THEN we'll get an event, and we can send a DM with onboarding links. Bingo.

[kitblake]

The script is modified to exhibit prime time behavior that needs to be tested. Since behavior is platform-independent of code (discussed elsewhere ;) we need to update. In parallel we'll find more fun.

[kitblake]

Briefing

This post is for people testing the Welcome Bot.

The goal of the Welcome Bot is to foster onboarding. When new users join the RChain Slack and express an intent – by joining a channel – the bot sends them a DM with a hello, links to related resources, and a personal contact who can answer questions.

The prime example is the welcome message for the Community channel which informs users about Activist activities, points to the Github workspace, links to the pre-registration form, and provides a mentor contact.

Other channels can benefit from having a Welcome Bot too. For the demo we have messages in Community, Identity, and Rholang. If a channel doesn't have a custom message then no DM is sent.

A channel should only have a welcome message if it contains useful info. The DMs need to have a high signal/noise ratio, otherwise users will start ignoring them.

Testing

• Use this invite link to get into the shadowslack: https://join.slack.com/t/rchain-ai/shared_invite/MjE5MjU5MzEzMDczLTE1MDE0ODk1MDYtMzJiMzkzNTE5MA
• Only three channels have welcome messages: Community, Identity, and Rholang.
• The code for the bot is on Github.
• Any issues or bugs found can be posted in this Github issue, #63.
• Of course, discussion can also happen in the shadowslack, but please be aware that the Welcome Bot is not the only bot active. You may encounter some resident intelligence.
• The shadowslack is hosted by @entropee and the bots are running on a Divvy server.

[kitblake]

Moved the welcomebot code to a project dir:
https://github.com/rchain/Members/tree/master/projects/bots/welcomebot

[patrick727]

@kitblake whats left to make this official? voting on it to use in the main slack?

[kitblake]

The way it was left in the Activist meeting was that we'll pick it up again this week, same time, same channel. That's 15 minutes before the Weekly Debrief starts, whatever time that is for readers.

Testing hasn't brought up any glitches (altho I don't see a lotta new slack users testing, ahem).

But assuming the idea is welcome and the code is clean then yes, permission to install it in the main slack is the next step.

[kitblake]

Upshot from the Activist hangout discussion

• @kitblake reported that there aren't a lot of test users testing but the testing hasn't found any glitches either.
• @drbloom recommended that we initiate the bot as a user, not as 'Slackbot'. We could call it 'Welcome Bot' or whatever.
• We also discussed NOT having the #community channel be one of the ones to which new users are automatically added. That means when users do join the channel we'll get an event and they'll get a welcome DM.
  • This could be automated by building a bot that listens to #announcements and then invites new users into the #community channel.
  • @jimscarver pointed out that doing it manually, where somebody says hi and invites the new users into #community, was also discussed.
  • After some consideration in the hangout we decided to proceed with the manual approach for now. The automated solution can be implemented if scale demands it.

[kitblake]

My cat joined the RChain Slack. He was auto-added to these channels:

announcements

behavioral-types

community

documentation

humour

random

[kitblake]

This weekend we figured out some API calls that both improved and simplified the Welcome Bot. It now has its own custom icon, plus user/channel names get rendered as links (you have to turn that on with 'link_names'). Did a little cleanup today. We think it's ready for prime time.

[entropee]

I want to remind everyone that we are running a Social Ledger trial on Mattermost. All research into the AI chatbot and to the Video Production Group will proceed from there. I also want to give a big thank you to Jim for finding another valuable resource that will prove most useful. The next step seems to be how do we merge the social ledger into RChain. Everyone needs to see Mattermost!

[entropee]

I feel like any second now I am going to reach the singularity in personal productivity.

[entropee]

It occurs to me that the best way to experience the Social Ledger thingamabob is to try to try to build your own pet project there like I did. Or you can help me.

[entropee]

It's already much better than both slack and shadowslack, combined.

Sorry for the rant. I am not used to github.

[lapin7]

Please always insert links to referenced material or tools. Like what's the address of mattermost. :-)

-- Cheers, HJ

On Fri, Sep 22, 2017 at 9:10 PM, Gary (otomplodomo on Slack) < notifications@github.com> wrote:

It's already much better than both slack and shadowslack, combined.

Sorry for the rant. I am not used to github.

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