hugonikanor/reddit-parenthesis-bot

A horrible Reddit Bot which closes unclosed parenthesis.

Reddit parenthesis bot

A simple reddit bot which adds missing close parenthesis on comments on reddit. By default set up to only run on /r/programmerhumor

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Currently it's kinda broken. That's what happens when you decide to learn writing reddit bots in the middle of the night, when you have to get up early the day after.

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This currently runns on the following cron job */5 * * * * /home/parenthesis-bot/programmerhumor/cron-task.sh

reddit-parenthesis-bot's Issues

Doesn't handle all smileys

Title

Emoticon checking still doesn't appear to work

The bot responded to this comment, despite the parenthesis being part of an emoticon: https://www.reddit.com/r/ProgrammerHumor/comments/4ktp12/my_colleague_ran_a_tool_to_document_our_code_base/d3idulq

You wrote a reddit bot in *bash*?

WTF, man?

(on an unrelated note, stop closing emoticons like :) and :()

Limit parenthesis count

Most genuine posts will have a limited number of parentheses anyhow, so I would suggest limiting the maximum number of parentheses the bot will react to. Something like fifteen or twenty should cover it, easy. In cases where this limit is broken, either reply with a generic "parenthesis limit reached" message or don't reply at all.

The bot doesn't close all parenthesis types

This bot closes only (, it doesn't close { or [.

For example, see this reddit link.

Please consider rate-limiting per submission

Right now the bot adds some nontrivial noise in threads where people are having good discussions.

I recommend limiting the bot's comments to a maximum of 1 per submission. You can also make exceptions for when users reply to the bot's threads.

Feature: accept summons from other subreddits?

If someone pages /u/parenthesis-bot from elsewhere, check the parent post for mismatches even if it's not in /r/ProgrammerHumor

Check etiquette for mod or user overrides though.

Negative depth parenthesis

Currently, the input

(()))))((((

is counted by count-paren.sh as 1. However, (()))))(((() is negative depth parentheses which is not valid parentheses.

Instead, perhaps we should ignore orphan close parentheses that do not match any open parentheses. For example the above input should be closed with )))).