Hutbot is a simple IRC bot that runs executable files (such as shell scripts) to respond to commands. You can extend it by adding new scripts, and there's no need to restart hutbot.

Assuming you have $GOPATH set,

go get github.com/hut8labs/hutbot
$GOPATH/bin/hutbot irc.example.com:6697 '#mychannel'

When hutbot joins your channel, you can talk to it:

hutbot [[email protected]] entered the room.
[you] hutbot: build myproject
[hutbot] ok, building myproject

When you address hutbot, the first word after its name is interpreted as the name of an executable to run (in hutbot's working directory) and the rest of the line is interpreted as a single string argument.

So, the above message causes hutbot to run ./build. The executable is called with "myproject" on stdin, and with a bunch of environment variables set:

• $HUTBOT_SENDER as the name of the sender ("you")
• $HUTBOT_CHANNEL as the name of the channel ("#mychannel")
• $HUTBOT_CREATED as the timestamp (seconds since epoch) for when the message was entered in IRC
• $HUTBOT_BOT as the name of the bot ("hutbot")
• $HUTBOT_DIR as hutbot's working directory
• $HUTBOT_COMMAND as the first word of the message to hutbot ("build")
• $HUTBOT_ARGS as the rest of the message to hutbot ("myproject")
• $HUTBOT_MESSAGE as the full message ("hutbot: build myproject")

Whatever ./build writes to stdout (in this case, "ok, building myproject") is sent back to IRC. So, ./build might contain:

#!/bin/bash

start-project-build ${HUTBOT_ARGS} && echo "ok, building ${HUTBOT_ARGS}" 

If ./build is a directory, hutbot will instead run each of the executable files in that directory. (You'll see why you'd want this in a bit.)

Hutbot also honors a few special script names.

These scripts let hutbot track who is in a channel.

• irc-join is called when a user joins a channel
• irc-part is called when a user parts a channel
• irc-quit is called when a user quits a channel

These scripts allow hutbot to respond dynamically to messages.

• .all is called for every message, even those not addressed to hutbot (except, for now, things that hutbot itself says)
• .missing is called whenever there's no script for a command

These scripts allow hutbot to take periodic actions (e.g., email a transcript of a conversation after nobody has spoken for 30 minutes). They are invoked with a subset of the usual environment variables ($HUTBOT_BOT and $HUTBOT_DIR).

• .minute is called once per minute
• .hour is called once per hour
• .day is called once per day