bcneng/candebot

Our lovely opinionated slack bot

Candebot

Our lovely opinionated Slack bot. Find it in BcnEng Slack workspace as @candebot.

Features

• Commands emulating a command line tool. Via Slack slash (/) or mentioning the bot. See /cmd. For example:
  • coc - Shows the Code of Conduct.
  • netiquette - Shows the Netiquette.
  • staff - Shows the list of staff members.
  • echo - Sending messages as the bot user. Only available to admins.
  • candebirthday - Days until @sdecandelario birthday! Something people cares.
• Filter stopwords in messages. Suggest more inclusive alternatives to the user. See /inclusion.
• Submission and validation of job posts. Posted in the #hiring-job-board channel via a form.
• Message actions. For example:
  • Deleting a message and the whole thread. Only available to admins.
  • Report messages to the admins.

Configuration

Candebot can be configured via Toml file + environment variables. The need for setting up environment variables when using the Toml file is due to the fact that some of the configurations is sensitive and should not be stored in a file.

Environment variables

All environment variables are prefixed with BOT_. For example, BOT_BOT_USER_TOKEN. If you want to change the prefix, you can set -env-prefix <prefix> flag when running the bot.

The following environment variables are needed in order to run the bot:

• BOT_BOT_USER_TOKEN - Slack bot user token. Used to authenticate the bot user.
• BOT_BOT_ADMIN_TOKEN - Slack user token with admin rights. Used to authenticate the bot user when performing admin actions.
• BOT_BOT_SERVER_SIGNING_SECRET - Slack app signing secret. Used to verify the authenticity of the requests.

There are more environment variables that can be set. Please, check /bot/config.go.

Toml File

By default, ./.bot.toml is used as the configuration file. If you want to change the path, you can set -config <filepath> flag when running the bot.

Please, use the following file as a reference.

Installation

go get -u github.com/bcneng/candebot

Usage

BOT_BOT_USER_TOKEN=<slack-bot-user-token> \
BOT_BOT_ADMIN_TOKEN=<slack-user-with-admin-rights-token> \ 
BOT_BOT_SERVER_SIGNING_SECRET=<slack-app-signing-secret> \

candebot

You can get your bot user token by creating a Slack app via https://api.slack.com/apps.

Deployment

There is no preference for deployment. You can deploy it in any way you want. For example, using Docker. The files required will always be:

• Compiled binary of the bot.
• .bot.toml file with the configuration.

candebot's Issues

Add currency list for job offers

We need to add a list with most common currencies

• EUR
• USD
• GBP

EUR need to be the default value

Add golanci.yml and fix issues

I've already started working on this.

Partially fixed here #67

Feature request: Anonymous messages

It would be nice to have an option to post anonymously for different channels like #hiring-discussions, even create a new #workplace-challenges channel. The idea is that people feel comfortable to express themselves without engaging their current or former coworkers.

**The idea came from another Slack channel.

[tests] Follow a table-driven test approach next time.

FYI, you can follow a table-driven test approach next time.

Example:

func TestValidate(t *testing.T) {
	tests := []struct {
		name           string
		val            string
		max            int
		min            int
		expectedErrors map[string]string
	}{
		{
			name: "fields for the salary are properly parsed",
			val:  "http://foo.com",
			max:  12,
			min:  10,
		},

		// more tests cases here
	}
	for _, test := range tests {
		t.Run(test.name, func(t *testing.T) {
			max, min, validateErrors := validateSubmission(test.val, test.max, test.min)
			if test.expectedErrors != nil {
				require.Empty(t, max)
				require.Empty(t, min)
				require.EqualValues(t, test.expectedErrors, validateErrors)
			} else {
				require.Equal(t, test.max, max)
				require.Equal(t, test.min, min)
			}
		})
	}
}

Originally posted by @smoya in #72 (comment)

Candebot won't create job post on iphone

I'm experiencing an issue where some input forms on Candebot "New Job Post" command void after filling some other inputs. It happens on my slack on iPhone.

Steps to Reproduce:

• Fill the first two inputs "Role" and "Company"
• Fill the rest inputs until "Link to the job spec"
• Then "Role" and "Company" are voided.

Note: If you try to fill them again, it voids the "Link to the job spec" and vice versa.

It seems it works normally on desktop

Fix double encoded report link

Welcome message

Copied from bcneng/website#13

como solución a esto, se puede hacer que el mensaje sólo le aparezca a la persona que se ha unido
una de las formas es automatizar un bot que envíe un PM con esa info
en este tuto se explica cómo hacerlo de forma sencilla: https://medium.com/@izzydoesizzy/create-a-slack-bot-that-privately-greets-new-users-in-5-easy-steps-a38eabeabcb5
Needs setting ?welcome, ?coc, ?netiquette

Create a bot command to show the github repo URL

Create a bot command to show the github repo URL or to explain where to create an issue for the bot

Feature request: Toot pinned Slack messages

I came up with the following idea I find cool; to toot (Tweet in Mastodon) every pinned (maybe only by Staff) Slack message, including a link to that message.

Why? I think this will help us spread the important topics and discussions we daily have in our community, giving visibility to more people, and also creating attraction for others to join BcnEng.

Collect usage metrics

We can take profit of free New Relic tier and collect usage metrics, i.e. # Job offers posted.

Delete Job Post message action is not working

Users are seeing the following error when trying to remove Job Posts they submitted.

Upgrade Go to 1.17

go.mod specifies 1.14 atm

Feature flag non-essential features

The candebot is too BcnEng-specific.

By adding a simple feature flag or two it could be stripped down of features that make it more generic (remove Candelario birthday, remote twtitter intergration or word-filtering, etc...).

This is related to #77

Extract hardcoded values as config

Recently a user raised their interest on reusing this bot on other slack channels (at least the job posting feature).

There are a few hardcoded values that are exclusive to BcnEng (URLs, list of forbidden words, etc...).

Allow user to report messages anonymously

As a Community Member
I would like to report messages that violates community COC and/or Netiquette anonymously
So that my identity could be protected.

Lowercase job offers

Avoid shouting please.

Example: https://bcneng.slack.com/archives/C30CUFT2B/p1621262761212200

Proposal: add field to #hiring-job-board offers with contract type

Many offers, esp. remote offers are for "contractor/freelancer/autónomo/self-employed" positions, because foreign companies without a Spanish legal entity cannot offer regular employee contacts.

Personally, I find this non-ideal, because I'm only interested in regular employee positions, and it makes it very hard to spot them.

I would propose a simple field with "employee" and other options.

2.5 validation range error message is too long

We should make the error message from https://github.com/bcneng/candebot/blob/master/bot/interact.go#L85-L87 shorter

cc @ignasi35 @gonzaloserrano

Enviar DM cuando se publica una oferta que no cumpla el formato

Ahora que ya llevamos tiempo con el bot reportando las ofertas, estaría bien que cuando detecta que una oferta no cumple el formato envíe un mensaje directo al usuario con el job spec

Add testing and deploy strategies

E.g how can I

• develop a new feature and test it
• deploy it

Resolve discussion: job posts new design

This is an issue to not forget the discussion #33

Allow add more info in job offer

Add a textarea, limited to 250(?) characters to add more information.

When the form is send, add in the thread of the same publication.

Add job field: part time, full time, 4 days, etc...

I don't know how to call it but it will be nice to have a field for part-time, full-time, 4 days, etc...

In Indeed for example, they call it: Job type and they have: Part-time, Full-time, Permanent, Temporary, Contract, Volunteer, Apprenticeship, Internship

In InfoJob they call it "Jornada Laboral" so maybe "Workday"?

Personally, I'm especially interested in the 4 days (or even less) part tbh.

Resolve discussion: suggestions for #hiring-job-board offers

This is an issue to not forget the discussion #54

Adopt "main" over "master" as the default branch

GitHub already provides the tools (I believe they're under settings) to rename master to main.

This change would align with the BcnEng community values.

Feature request: admins to have the ability to "close" a thread

Sometimes, threads can blow out or go out of control 🔥 . Slack doesn't have the future for not allowing more people to write in a thread but maybe Candebot could help by adding a new action on message threads where admins can set a thread as closed, so Candebot removes any new message posted in there from that time, adding a ephemeral message (only visible to the user) saying the thread is closed.

For this, we would need a DB to store the state.