Building Bots with Node.js

Automate workflow and internal communication processes and provide customer service without apps using messaging and interactive bots

About This Book

• Create interactive bots on platforms such as Facebook Messenger, Kik, Telegram, and Skype to automate workflows
• Create a bot that works with SQL Server and Skype to deal with HR requests within a company
• Work with some of the most cutting-edge and widely-used APIs and messaging platforms to create interactive customer-facing experiences and automate work

Who This Book Is For

This is a book for Node.js developers who want to build powerful bots for customer-facing and internal workflow automation.

What You Will Learn

• Create a bot template that responds to e-mails based on certain ruling criteria
• Interact with SMS and perform some basic Natural Language Processing using the Twilio API for Node.js
• Work with the Skype Web SDK and Node.js to create a bot that works with SQL Server and Skype
• Build an automated Flight Information Agent bot using the Twitter and Air France KLM APIs
• Create a scheduling bot for teams using the Facebook Messenger API
• Interact with BotKit along with and MongoDB Amazon S3 to create a document management bot in Node.js
• Leverage ICR and Azure Table Storage from Node.js to create a bug tracking bot
• Integrate Force.com API and Kik to create a Salesforce CRM bot

In Detail

The bots are taking over and we're all for it! Messenger-based bots will be the dominant software UI for the next generation of applications – even Slack, Telegram, and Facebook are driving a new approach where "threads are the new apps."

This book shows you how to create work automation bots that interact with users through Slack, e-mail, Skype, Twitter, and more using Node.js. You'll learn to create conversational UIs for your Node.js apps, and then use those UIs to provide workflow automation tools.

You will be shown how to handle customer service requests that come in through messenger systems – this includes interpreting the natural language to reveal the user's intent and respond accordingly. You will also learn how to automate processes that involve several people, such as processing holiday requests, arranging meetings, or sending updated reports on time.

By the end of this book you'll have the knowledge to create bots that can handle and manipulate documents, URLs, and other items of content. Harness the power of bots and your organization will reap the benefits.

Style and approach

This fast-paced book is packed with real-world use cases that will help you understand concepts, issues, and solutions while using Node.js to build useful, cross-platform business bots.