80.skills-simple-bot-to-bot

SimpleBotToBot Echo Skill

Bot Framework v4 skills echo sample.

This bot has been created using Bot Framework, it shows how to create a simple skill consumer (SimpleRootBot) that sends message activities to a skill (EchoSkillBot) that echoes it back.

This sample is a Spring Boot app and uses the Azure CLI and azure-webapp Maven plugin to deploy to Azure.

Prerequisites

• Java 1.8+
• Install Maven
• An account on Azure if you want to deploy to Azure.

Key concepts in this sample

The solution includes a parent bot (SimpleRootBot) and a skill bot (EchoSkillBot) and shows how the parent bot can post activities to the skill bot and returns the skill responses to the user.

• SimpleRootBot: this project shows how to consume an echo skill and includes:
  • A RootBot that calls the echo skill and keeps the conversation active until the user says "end" or "stop". RootBot also keeps track of the conversation with the skill and handles the EndOfConversation activity received from the skill to terminate the conversation
  • A simple SkillConversationIdFactory based on an in memory Map that creates and maintains conversation IDs used to interact with a skill
  • A SkillsConfiguration class that can load skill definitions from appsettings
  • A SkillController that handles skill responses
  • An AllowedSkillsClaimsValidator class that is used to authenticate that responses sent to the bot are coming from the configured skills
  • A Application class that shows how to register the different skill components for dependency injection
• EchoSkillBot: this project shows a simple echo skill that receives message activities from the parent bot and echoes what the user said. This project includes:
  • A sample EchoBot that shows how to send EndOfConversation based on the message sent to the skill and yield control back to the parent bot
  • A sample AllowedCallersClaimsValidator that shows how validate that the skill is only invoked from a list of allowed callers
  • A sample skill manifest that describes what the skill can do

To try this sample

• Create a bot registration in the azure portal for the EchoSkillBot and update EchoSkillBot/application.properties with the MicrosoftAppId and MicrosoftAppPassword of the new bot registration
• Create a bot registration in the azure portal for the SimpleRootBot and update SimpleRootBot/application.properties with the MicrosoftAppId and MicrosoftAppPassword of the new bot registration
• Update the BotFrameworkSkills section in SimpleRootBot/application.properties with the app ID for the skill you created in the previous step
• (Optionally) Add the SimpleRootBot MicrosoftAppId to the AllowedCallers list in EchoSkillBot/application.properties
• Open the SimpleBotToBot project and start it for debugging
• Open the EchoSkillsBot project and start it for debugging

Testing the bot using Bot Framework Emulator

Bot Framework Emulator is a desktop application that allows bot developers to test and debug their bots on localhost or running remotely through a tunnel.

• Install the Bot Framework Emulator version 4.7.0 or greater from here

Connect to the bot using Bot Framework Emulator

• Launch Bot Framework Emulator
• File -> Open Bot
• Enter a Bot URL of http://localhost:3978/api/messages, the MicrosoftAppId and MicrosoftAppPassword for the SimpleRootBot

Deploy the bot to Azure

As described on Deploy your bot, you will perform the first 4 steps to setup the Azure app, then deploy the code using the azure-webapp Maven plugin.

These steps should be followed to deploy the DialogRootBot and DialogSkillBot.

1. Login to Azure

From a command (or PowerShell) prompt in the root of the bot folder, execute: az login

2. Set the subscription

az account set --subscription "<azure-subscription>"

If you aren't sure which subscription to use for deploying the bot, you can view the list of subscriptions for your account by using az account list command.

3. Create an App registration

az ad app create --display-name "<botname>" --password "<appsecret>" --available-to-other-tenants

Replace <botname> and <appsecret> with your own values.

<botname> is the unique name of your bot. <appsecret> is a minimum 16 character password for your bot.

Record the appid from the returned JSON

4. Create the Azure resources

Replace the values for <appid>, <appsecret>, <botname>, and <groupname> in the following commands:

To a new Resource Group

az deployment sub create --name "botDeploy" --location "westus" --template-file ".\deploymentTemplates\template-with-new-rg.json" --parameters appId="<appid>" appSecret="<appsecret>" botId="<botname>" botSku=S1 newAppServicePlanName="botPlan" newWebAppName="bot" groupLocation="westus" newAppServicePlanLocation="westus"

To an existing Resource Group

az deployment group create --resource-group "<groupname>" --template-file ".\deploymentTemplates\template-with-preexisting-rg.json" --parameters appId="<appid>" appSecret="<appsecret>" botId="<botname>" newWebAppName="bot" newAppServicePlanName="botPlan" appServicePlanLocation="westus" --name "bot"

5. Update app id and password

In src/main/resources/application.properties update

• MicrosoftAppPassword with the botsecret value
• MicrosoftAppId with the appid from the first step

6. Deploy the code

• Execute mvn clean package
• Execute mvn azure-webapp:deploy -Dgroupname="<groupname>" -Dbotname="<bot-app-service-name>"

If the deployment is successful, you will be able to test it via "Test in Web Chat" from the Azure Portal using the "Bot Channel Registration" for the bot.

After the bot is deployed, you only need to execute #6 if you make changes to the bot.