Remote Bob v1.0.4

Video: Remote Bob in Slack

Watch the full video (MP4, 1:50, 1080p)
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An English-only visual tutorial, created with
HyperFrames, covering the
features available in Remote Bob v1.0.4:

Time	Topic
00:00	Remote Bob in Slack
00:10	App setup, tokens, container and invitation
00:24	Request a task without an @mention
00:37	Continue with context in the same thread
00:48	Attach images and documents
01:01	Cancel an active job
01:12	Recurring reports, UTC and channel delivery
01:27	Chat with /jobs versus verification/retry with /run
01:39	Trusted channels, local API and persistent files

Illustrative demo, not a live session recording. Responses and the
schedule ID are examples. No real Slack or IBM tasks were executed to produce
the video. All on-screen text is in English, including example conversations,
channel names and filenames. The video has no audio.

The original release notes are preserved below. The video is hosted in the
repository and linked here as documentation; the published v1.0.4 tag and
runtime code have not changed.

Highlights

• Remote Bob is the new project name. The repository, Compose project,
  image, and container are named remote_bob; the Compose service remains bob.
• Active jobs remain available for polling, streaming, and cancellation when
  BOB_MAX_JOBS is exceeded. Only finished runs are evicted, oldest first.
• Background process launch errors now reach a terminal failure state with
  exit code 126 and a visible diagnostic. A missing executable still uses 127.
• Invalid bytes in background output are replaced instead of leaving a job
  unfinished. Regression tests cover final SSE events and verify/retry flows.
• REMOTE_BOB_URL is the preferred API URL setting for Slack and the scheduler.
  Existing HARNESS_URL settings remain supported as a fallback.
• Updated README, Slack setup guides and manifest, runtime project context,
  OpenAPI export, and Postman collection.

Upgrade Notes

Stop the old deployment using its existing Compose file before switching to
this release, so it releases port 8080:

podman compose down
git remote set-url origin https://github.com/BrUn3y/remote_bob.git
git fetch origin --tags
git switch --detach v1.0.4
podman compose up --build -d

Keep your existing .env and workspace/ directory. The
./workspace:/workspace bind mount is unchanged; attachments and persisted
schedules stay in that directory. A fresh checkout needs those files transferred
before starting. Docker users can replace podman with docker.

The previous BrUn3y/IBM_Bob_Harness repository URL redirects to the renamed
repository. Do not reuse the previous repository name if that redirect should
remain available.

An already-installed Slack app must be renamed separately in Slack's app
settings: app name Remote Bob, bot display name remote_bob. Existing
tokens remain usable; editing the manifest does not rename a live app.

API paths, job types, orchestration markers, IBM's bob command, and .bob/
configuration remain compatible. The API version remains 1.4.0. The pinned
IBM Bob Shell 2.0.5 and Node.js 24.21.0 runtimes are unchanged.

Verification

• 125 tests passed on Python 3.12.14, with unhandled pytest thread
  exceptions treated as errors.
• Includes local Python/bash integration tests for output decoding,
  cancellation, timeout, and verify/retry, without live IBM or Slack calls.
• Python compilation, Bash syntax, Compose configuration, and Git whitespace
  checks passed.
• One existing Starlette/AnyIO deprecation warning remains.

This is a source release. No prebuilt container was published, and the complete
container image was not rebuilt or exercised against live IBM/Slack services
for this release.

Changes

• Job lifecycle reliability: #7
• Rename to Remote Bob: #8
• Full comparison: v1.0.3...v1.0.4

Bob Shell 2.0.5 and Slack file support

Highlights

• Upgrades the container to IBM Bob Shell 2.0.5.
• Pins Node.js to 24.21.0 and verifies the Bob Shell tarball with SHA-256 before installation.
• Disables Bob Shell runtime auto-updates to keep container builds reproducible.
• Bounds the startup license/authentication preflight to 60 seconds and one turn while preserving visible failures.
• Adds Slack file attachment handling, persisted thread context, upload cleanup and quota controls, duplicate-event suppression, concurrency limits, and cancellable jobs.
• Adds DELETE /jobs/{id} and updates the REST API to version 1.4.0.
• Adds workshop documentation plus Postman and OpenAPI examples.

Upgrade notes

Rebuild the image so the pinned Bob Shell, Node.js runtime, and settings are applied:

podman compose up --build

Bob Shell 2.0.5 supports Node.js 22 or later. The container uses the pinned Node.js 24.21.0 package; host and systemd installations are not changed by this release.

Verification

• 105 offline pytest tests passed.
• The Podman image built successfully with Bob Shell 2.0.5 and Node.js 24.21.0.
• The Bob tarball checksum was accepted; an intentionally incorrect checksum was rejected before installation.
• The running container returned HTTP 200 from /health with Bob present.

Changes

• Bob Shell 2.0.5 upgrade and hardening: #6
• Full comparison: v1.0.2...v1.0.3

Bob shell 2 integration

Bob Shell 2.x Integration

Upgrades the harness to be compatible with Bob Shell 2.x, which introduced a breaking CLI change and a new transcript format.

CLI command change

Bob 2.x replaced the flat-flag invocation with a run subcommand:

	Before (1.x)	After (2.x)
Command	bob --accept-license -p <prompt> --chat-mode=<mode> --yolo	bob run --accept-license --mode <mode> <prompt>
Version	1.0.5	2.0.1

The --yolo flag is no longer needed — headless mode auto-approves by default.

Transcript parsing

Bob 2.x changed its output format from ---output--- block markers to separator-delimited
(──────────) turn transcripts with labeled Assistant (N) segments.
The Slack bot's clean_output() function now:

1. Detects the 2.x separator format and extracts the last Assistant segment.
2. Falls back to the 1.x ---output--- block logic for backward compatibility.
3. Falls back further to plain noise-stripping if neither format is detected.

Files changed

• Dockerfile / docker-compose.yml — version pin bumped to 2.0.1
• api/server.py — updated _bob_cmd() to emit the new run subcommand shape
• api/slack_bot.py — added _extract_bob2_answer() and updated clean_output()
• api/test_server.py — assertions updated to match the new command structure

IBM_Bob_Slack_Integration

Public release of Bob Harness — a container that wraps IBM's Bob
Shell and turns its headless, one-shot CLI into a long-running service you can
drive over HTTP, from Slack, or on a schedule.

Bob Shell has no native server mode. This project wraps its
bob -p "<prompt>" --yolo --chat-mode=unrestricted-dev invocation and adds a
REST API, a verify/retry loop, a Slack bot, and a cron scheduler on top.

✨ Highlights

• REST API (FastAPI, v1.3.0) — call Bob programmatically: synchronous,
  streaming (SSE), or fire-and-forget async jobs.
• Verify / retry loop — POST /run re-runs Bob until a shell check
  command passes (exit 0), up to max_attempts.
• Bidirectional Slack bot — talk to Bob in a channel with no @-mention;
  it replies in-thread over Socket Mode (no public URL required), with a
  live rotating "Bob is thinking…" placeholder.
• Cron scheduler — register recurring runs via POST /schedules; a
  persisted registry survives restarts and posts results to Slack.
• Custom unrestricted-dev mode — full read/edit/command/browser/mcp access,
  governing the whole container.
• Single-container deployment — serve-all runs the API and the bot
  together; ships with a HEALTHCHECK and a compose-level healthcheck.

🔌 REST API

Method	Path	Purpose
GET	/health	Liveness / readiness probe
POST	/invoke	Run Bob and wait for the full result
POST	/stream	Same, streamed as Server-Sent Events
POST	/jobs	Fire-and-forget async run → {id, status}
GET	/jobs, /jobs/{id}, /jobs/{id}/stream	List / poll / stream jobs
POST	/run	Run with a verify/retry loop
POST	/schedules	Register a cron job
GET/DELETE	/schedules, /schedules/{id}	Manage schedules
POST	/schedules/{id}/run	Trigger a schedule now

Interactive docs at /docs (Swagger) and /openapi.json.

🚀 Getting started

cp .env.example .env          # add your BOBSHELL_API_KEY (+ Slack tokens)
podman compose up --build     # or: docker compose up --build
curl http://localhost:8080/health

- Full docs: README.md
- Slack setup, step by step: SLACK_SETUP.md
- HTTPie / Postman collection to try every endpoint: httpie/

v1.0.0 — Bob Harness: run Bob Shell autonomously via REST API, Slack & cron

First public release of Bob Harness — a container that wraps IBM's Bob
Shell and turns its headless, one-shot CLI into a long-running service you can
drive over HTTP, from Slack, or on a schedule.

Bob Shell has no native server mode. This project wraps its
bob -p "<prompt>" --yolo --chat-mode=unrestricted-dev invocation and adds a
REST API, a verify/retry loop, a Slack bot, and a cron scheduler on top.

✨ Highlights

• REST API (FastAPI, v1.3.0) — call Bob programmatically: synchronous,
  streaming (SSE), or fire-and-forget async jobs.
• Verify / retry loop — POST /run re-runs Bob until a shell check
  command passes (exit 0), up to max_attempts.
• Bidirectional Slack bot — talk to Bob in a channel with no @-mention;
  it replies in-thread over Socket Mode (no public URL required), with a
  live rotating "Bob is thinking…" placeholder.
• Cron scheduler — register recurring runs via POST /schedules; a
  persisted registry survives restarts and posts results to Slack.
• Custom unrestricted-dev mode — full read/edit/command/browser/mcp access,
  governing the whole container.
• Single-container deployment — serve-all runs the API and the bot
  together; ships with a HEALTHCHECK and a compose-level healthcheck.

🔌 REST API

Method	Path	Purpose
GET	/health	Liveness / readiness probe
POST	/invoke	Run Bob and wait for the full result
POST	/stream	Same, streamed as Server-Sent Events
POST	/jobs	Fire-and-forget async run → {id, status}
GET	/jobs, /jobs/{id}, /jobs/{id}/stream	List / poll / stream jobs
POST	/run	Run with a verify/retry loop
POST	/schedules	Register a cron job
GET/DELETE	/schedules, /schedules/{id}	Manage schedules
POST	/schedules/{id}/run	Trigger a schedule now

Interactive docs at /docs (Swagger) and /openapi.json.

🚀 Getting started

cp .env.example .env          # add your BOBSHELL_API_KEY (+ Slack tokens)
podman compose up --build     # or: docker compose up --build
curl http://localhost:8080/health

- Full docs: README.md
- Slack setup, step by step: SLACK_SETUP.md
- HTTPie / Postman collection to try every endpoint: httpie/