Kijiji-fb-bot NPM

kijiji-fb-bot

A node.js bot that scrapes recent Kijiji ads and sends them in a Facebook message.

Features

Automatically receive new Kijiji ads matching given search criteria
Send commands to the bot to manually retrieve ads

Dependencies

node.js - evented I/O for the backend
kijiji-scraper - Kijiji ad scraper
facebook-chat-api - unofficial Facebook chat API for node.js

Installation

npm install kijiji-fb-bot

Configuration

You can configure the bot by placing the following JSON files in a configuration directory:

botprops.json - Contains basic bot properties:

 {
    "name": "bot name (used for chat commands)",
    "chatId": <chat id to send automatic updates>,
    "scrapeInterval": <frequency of scrapes (in ms)>,
    "remoteAdmin": <1 or 0>
 }

facebook.json - Contains the Facebook credentials the bot will use to log in:

{
    "email": "Facebook account email",
    "password": "Facebook account password"
}

adprefs.json - Contains the Kijiji ad search category and location. See the prefs argument for kijiji-scraper's query() function.
searchparams.json - Contains the Kijiji ad search criteria. See the params argument for kijiji-scraper's query() function.

Documentation

init(configDir, callback)

Will call callback with a function to stop the bot.

Arguments

configDir - The directory containing the bot's configuration files.
callback(err, stop) - A callback called after the bot has been started. If there is an error, err will not be null. If everything was successful, stop will be a function that, when called, sets the bot to stop after the next chat message is received. It cannot be stopped immediately as a result of a limitation of the facebook-chat-api module.

Example usage

var bot = require("kijiji-fb-bot");

bot("json/botconfig", function(err, stop) {
    //The bot will work its magic
    //Call stop() when done
});

Chat commands

The bot can be interacted with by sending it Facebook messages. Each command must be prefixed with the bot name specified in botprops.json. The following commands are supported:

list - The bot will reply with a list of the last scraped ads.
scrape - The bot will scrape and reply with ads posted to Kijiji since the last scrape.
info - The bot will reply with information about its state.
help - The bot will reply with information about its chat commands.

Additionally, if remoteAdmin is set to 1 in botprops.json, the following chat commands will be available:

botprop [prop] [val] - Will set the value of property prop specified in botprops.json to val.
adpref [pref] [val] - Will set the value of preference pref specified in adprefs.json to val.
searchparam [param] [val] - Will set the value of parameter param specified in searchparams.json to val.