Plugins

What the frick is a plugin??!?

A plugin (alternatively "add-on", "extension", "module", etc...) is a component to add a particular feature. The result of plugins is much greater customization abilities.

Now that we have the boring definition out of the way, this is what plugins mean the The Engine: Plugins are additional files that allow you to add more functionality, including new /commands and regex "triggers". Plugins will allow you to customize The Engine to the be the bot you wish.

The Engine at its core has little to no functionality, and 0 interaction methods. All this is added by the plugins; Our plugin platform is very powerful in that it allows access to anything and everything within the bots abilities. Meaning you can create a plugin for just about anything within the capabilities of a bot.

A good way to look at the core/plugin relationship is the example of an apple tree 🌳: An apple 🍎 is something we interact with, we eat it, we cook it, etc... Though the tree 🌳... Isn't. As far as the tree goes, it is just the platform from which we get the nice juicy apple. But without it we'd be fruitless, and no one likes fruitlessness.

The tree is the core of our bot, it doesn't mean much to the end user, you can't eat it (unless you're barking bad 🐶 🌲), You wouldn't cook it, but what it does do is it bares the great, juicy, succulent apples, I mean plugins, plugins...

If you don't understand the relation of the bots core and the plugins from that... Very deep and well descriptive metaphor, I'm afraid you're a lost cause.

Plugin architecture

The structure of a plugin is a little different to what you'll see in most telegram bots. This is because we wanted something that is both fully functional, yet not too hard to understand.

General structure:

To be continued...