A Two-Way Messagin Bot for Telegram

This bot can be used to communicate between people and a group chat similarly to a share email box.

The way it works is that a private message sent to the bot is anonymously forwarded to a group chat. If in the group chat someone replys to the forwarded message, the reply is forwarded back to the original sender, again anonymously.

Usage

Setting up with BotFather

• Set-up a bot using BotFather and receive a bot token.
• In BotFather set the privacy mode such that the bot has access to all messages by /help -> /setprivacy -> Disable.
• Set-up a group chat and add your bot.

Setup docker to your computer or server

Setup docker

Clone repo

git clone https://github.com/AS-kilta/telegram-feedback-bot
cd telegram-messaging-bot

Credentials

In docker-compose.yml set BOT_TOKEN to your bots token which you got from BotFather.

Then run your docker with docker compose up and send to bot message /whoami. Now you got your CHAT_ID. Close bot by pressing ctrl-c.

In docker-compose.yml set CHAT_ID to your chat id.

Now you can run your bot on server with:

docker compose build && docker compose up

Or if you want to set it to run in the background

docker compose build && docker compose up -d

Build docker image

docker compose build

Or if you want to set it to run in the background

docker compose build

Run docker image

docker compose up

Or if you want to set it to run in the background

docker compose up -d

Develop without docker

Clone repo and install libraries

git clone https://github.com/AS-kilta/telegram-feedback-bot
cd telegram-messaging-bot

pip install -r requirements.txt

Set enviroment variables to your BOT_TOKEN and CHAT_ID

export BOT_TOKEN=<bot token>
export CHAT_ID=<chat id>

Start the bot.

python telegram-messaging-bot.py

Got to the group chat and type /whoami. The bot should reply with your chat's ID.

Edit telegram-messagin-bot.py again and add the received chat ID as CHAT_ID variable.

Start the bot again

python telegram-messaging-bot.py

I recommend running the bot on a server in a terminal window for example using Tmux.

Now everything should work. Test the bot by sending it a private message and replying to it from the group chat.