dapp-0-bot

Our first Rasa chatbot for the Internet Computer.

The live deployment can be found at https://web3r.chat

The full application consists of 3 GitHub repositories:

1. dapp-0
2. dapp-0-django
3. dapp-0-bot

Git

git clone [email protected]:web3r-chat/dapp-0-bot.git
cd dapp-0-bot

Internet Identity

The action server makes authenticated calls to canister_motoko, using a dedicated internet identity.

• We used dfx to create the dfx identity dapp-0-bot-action-server, with the command:

  dfx identity new dapp-0-bot-action-server
  
  # The private key is stored in the file:
  # ~/.config/dfx/identity/dapp-0-bot-action-server/identity.pem

• We used dfx to specify that this identity uses our regular cycles wallet, with the commands:

  # Issue these commands from the web3r_chat repository
  dfx identity --network ic use dapp-0-bot-action-server
  dfx identity --network ic set-wallet aaaaa-aaaaa-aaaaa-aaaaa-aaa  # Replace with your wallet id !
  
  # Verify it is all ok
  dfx identity --network ic get-wallet 
  
  # Reset identity to default
  dfx identity --network ic use default

• We base64 encoded the pem file into a single line with the command:

  base64 -w 0 ~/.config/dfx/identity/dapp-0-bot-action-server/identity.pem

• We pass this value into our action server via the environment variable BOT_0_ACTION_SERVER_IC_IDENTITY_PEM_ENCODED

  • Locally, store it in .env

• We extract it in the file actions/settings.py

• We figured out the principal of this identity by calling the whoami method.

  • We updated the value for _bot_0_action_server_principal in the smart contract of the dapp-0 repository:

    # file: dapp-0/src/backend/motoko/auth.mo
    
    public func is_django_server(p: Principal) : Result.Result<(), Http.StatusCode> {
        ...
        let _bot_0_action_server_principal : Principal = Principal.fromText("xxxx-xxxx-...");
    	...
    };

• Now we can use use ic-py to make authenticated calls from the action server's python code to the protected APIs of the smart contract that is running in the motoko_canister on the Internet Computer.

Secrets in .env

Create a .env file that looks like this:

#
# Only needed when deploying to Digital Ocean
# Access token is used to authenticate doctl with: make doctl-auth-init 
DIGITALOCEAN_ACCESS_TOKEN="..."

#
# JWT protection for socketio channel, using HS256
# Value must be equal to the SECRET_JWT_KEY value of the django_server
SECRET_JWT_KEY="..."
JWT_METHOD="HS256"

#
# Action server connection to local services
IC_NETWORK_URL="http://localhost:8000"
CANISTER_MOTOKO_ID="..."
CANISTER_MOTOKO_CANDID_UI="http://localhost:8000?canisterId=...&id=..."

#
# Action server internet identity
BOT_0_ACTION_SERVER_IC_IDENTITY_PEM_ENCODED="..."

To set the environment variables in your shell:

export $(cat .env | grep -v '#' | xargs)

Conda

Download MiniConda and then install it:

bash Miniconda3-xxxxx.sh

Create a conda environment with Python:

Note: we use python 3.8, because the rasa-sdk is still at python 3.8

conda create --name dapp-0-bot python=3.8
conda activate dapp-0-bot

pip install --upgrade pip
pip install -r requirements-dev.txt

Train the bot

rasa train --domain domain

Test the bot

rasa test --domain domain

This will run end-to-end testing on the conversations in tests/test_stories.yml. All tests must pass.

Run the Rasa Server

# Set the environment variables in your shell
export $(cat .env | grep -v '#' | xargs)

# Run the rasa server
rasa run [--debug]

Run the Action Server

# Set the environment variables in your shell
export $(cat .env | grep -v '#' | xargs)

# Run the action server
rasa run actions [--debug]

Smoketest

make smoketest