paperbot

A Slack bot for personalized, filtered and trackable arXiv output.

Installation:

• To start, web sign in to your user account corresponding to the Slack workspace where you would like to install paperbot.
• Create a new Slack App. In the pop-up window, set 'paperbot' as App Name and choose your Development Slack Workspace.
• Choose paperbot in the Apps page, and click on Bot Users from the menu at the left below "Features". Now select Add a Bot User and choose the bot's Display name. Finally, click on Add Bot User and Save Changes.
• In the current window, choose Install App from the menu at the left below "Settings". Click on Install App to Workspace and Authorize. Copy the Bot User OAuth Access Token and save it somewhere to use later.
• Open the web-based Slack App corresponding to your workspace and create a new channel. Invite paperbot to this channel as if you were inviting another workspace user to it. If you now click on the address bar of your web browser, you will note that it looks like this: https://yourworkspace.slack.com/messages/CHANNEL_ID/something_else. Copy the CHANNEL_ID variable and save it somewhere to use later.
• Install requirements by executing pip install -r requirements.txt on a terminal.
• Clone the paperbot GitHub repository to your machine.
• Do cd to the paperbot folder in the cloned repository, open config.py and change the variables SLACK_BOT_TOKEN and CHANNEL_ID by the previously saved Bot User OAuth Access Token and CHANNEL_ID, respectively.
• Done! Execute the bot by doing python paperbot.py or, in the background, by doing nohup python paperbot.py > custom-out.log &.
• Note that you can also command paperbot by private messages. You will find the app in the 'Apps' menu bellow the 'Direct Messages' menu of your Slack Desktop application.

Customization:

Automatic daily posts

In config.py, choose the time of the automatic posts by modifying the variable auto_commands. By default, the command "todays" is executed every weekday at 08:30 AM (local time), and the command "home" can be configured to print at some other time. We recommend to comment the line ("13:30:00", ['Mon', 'Wed', 'Fri'], "home") which is there as an example.

Choose the default arXiv sections to monitor

In config.py, change the variable arxiv_sections=[quant-ph, cond-mat] to include the arXiv sections you want to monitor.

Build the keywords and authors list

Paperbot stores keywords that are used to identify interesting preprints. The keywords list can be built manually by executing the command @paperbot add some_keyword on Slack. This adds some_keyword to your keywords list, which can be printed executing "@paperbot list" on Slack.

Paperbot also provides a method to generate an author list automatically. This is an important feature that helps to easily build a powerful preprint filter. It requires the definition of a few root keywords, such as 'superconducting qubit', 'quantum optics', and 'quantum information'. Executing the command @paperbot build 2018 ['superconducting qubit', 'quantum optics', 'quantum information'] threshold on Slack, paperbot searches through the arXiv papers submitted in '2018' and saving the name of the authors that have at least a 'threshold' number of papers including any of the root keywords in its title or abstract. The result of further executions of the build command is always appended to the author list after removing duplicates. In particular, running build every new year keeps the author list up-to-date.

Authors can also be manually added to the author list. This is done by executing the command @paperbot add_author some_author on Slack. Moreover, executing @paperbot authors on Slack prints the author list.

Define your favorite authors to be hightlighted

Parperbot can store the names of your favorite authors. If a new arXiv preprint includes one or more of such names, paperbot highlights the preprint with symbols that you can choose. For instance, executing on Slack the command @paperbot add_special michel devoret, :tada:, :tada: stores 'Michel Devoret' as favourite author. Next time that a preprint is submitted with him as an author, it will be posted and highlighted with 🎉. Note that your favorite authors must also be included in the authors list, and that paperbot performs a case-insensitive search.

Usage:

Doing @paperbot paper on Slack prints todays' arxiv papers. The full call is @paperbot paper sections=[quant-ph, cond-mat] keywords=[qubit, superconductor] author=[A. Blais, Michel Devoret] span=1. Here, the command output shows arXiv preprints from the sections 'sections', containing the keywords 'keywords' from the authors 'authors'. Span is the number of days from today to fetch papers. You can also set the span as dates: begin=YYYY-MM-DD end=YYYY-MM-DD.

When not specifically given, keywords and authors are taken from internal keywords lists. You can see and add elements to those lists with: "add","list","add_author","authors".

Note that for unknown reasons, paperbot Salck App status might appear as 'offline' while being online and working correctly.

A preview of the links posted by paperbot will appear by default on Slack. This feature can be disabled individually by the workspace users, or fully deactivated by the workspace administrator.

Take a look at config.py, where you can set a shortcut for preferred options, change the calls and set commands to be at set times. For more information, execute @paperbot help on Slack!

by TheSQuaD team (Theory of Superconducting Quantum Devices).