Introduction
In this article, I would like to cover the topic of how you can make your Telegram bot visible and accessible to others, that is, its placement and maintenance on the server. So anyone can try out your bot.
I will show an example of deploying a Telegram bot on a beget VPS server. Because I know him well. But this article is universal for any hosting provider.
And without further ado, let's get started with deployment.
Preparing the server for operation and deploying it
So, you have a ready-made project with a bot; it starts and works for you. But you can’t leave the computer (and therefore the program) on forever. This means we deploy it on other computers that we don’t mind. Yes, I'm talking about servers, hosting, and VPS.
And so, we came to the question of how to deploy a server. And where to get it. In a beget cloud tab in your personal cabinet.
- Click on the cloud tab.
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Then click on the create button.
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Customize the server for yourself.
Adding a project to the server
After the server has been created and configured for you. You will need to go to it.
To do this, copy
external IP, and enter it in the console
You will be asked for your password. It is usually sent by registered mail. Enter it.
Updating packages and external dependencies
Go to your home directory.
Transferring a project to a server
Using Git
Cloning the project
And correspondingly
To update the project
Without Git
Create an empty directory.
And let's go there.
To transfer project files, use the hosting file manager or, like me, use the scp command.
/path/to/project is the project folder on the local machine.
YOur_IP is the IP issued by the hosting
/path/where/to/save is the location where the project folder will be moved on the server
Setting up a virtual Python environment
If you do not use a virtual environment when creating bots (which is, of course, not recommended), then you can safely skip this step.
After all project files have been transferred. We will need to make sure that all the necessary python packages are installed.
To do this, let's create a virtual environment.
Let's activate it.
Installing dependencies
Without dependency file
If there is no dependency file, which was made by the pip freeze command, then you will have to personally install all the packages that need to be installed.
and so on
With dependency file
If there is a dependency file. Usually, dependency files are made by this command.
And installing dependencies by:
Checking the status of the bot on the server
To check if everything is working. Let's follow the same steps as when developing on a local machine.
Go to the project directory on the server
Activate the virtual environment (if used).
Launch the bot.
Open Telegram and give commands to the bot. If he answers, well, then everything worked
Automating project updates
A small digression on the topic
Everything works, and in principle, we could stop there. But the server has the property of rebooting from time to time. Yes, and you will also have to restart your bot too.
We are busy people, right? Why do we need to remember and constantly check whether the bot is working or not? It is better to automate this task, like any other.
Creating the necessary files
To do this, we will create a systemd service, a daemon, and a script that this service will run.
Let's create a service.
Let's edit the file.
Paste the following code there:
/Where/Your/Bot/Project/Exist/ is just your project directory.
/Where/Your/Bot/Project/Exist/start.sh is just the location of the bot startup script.
Next, we will create a script for launching the bot. Usually, I create it in the project directory in advance.
Let's add an execution bit to it. Let's give it the opportunity to be launched from the terminal.
Let's add the following content to the script:
Initializing the service and starting it
There are just a couple of commands left to run.
It is not clear from the output of these commands whether the service started successfully or not. To check and find out for sure, run the command
If active(running). This means the service has started successfully.
You can also see that the service is enabled. This means that every time the system starts or reboots, this service will start automatically.
Preparing the project for long-term support
Many people, including me before, underestimated this step. Until you personally encounter monotony and repetition of steps, that could be avoided if everything was done and configured correctly.
Here are the typical steps for everyone who is going to update their Telegram bots.
- Login to the server (ssh or specialized hosting admin panel).
- Go to the project directory.
- Transfer new files from the local computer to the server (ssh-move or hosting file manager).
- Make sure you don't break anything.
- Make sure you have transferred everything.
- Find out that something else needs to be improved, and repeat the process again.
And this is without databases. Yes, and I combined some steps into one. So, for example, transferring files to the server is quite a difficult task. It becomes even more dangerous if you do not make backups. God forbid you make a mistake and overwrite something. Everything is gonna be lost.
For myself, I identified three main problems when updating projects:
- Access problem
- Validation problem
- Backup problem
The first problem can be solved using an ssh client and RSA-generated passwords. The second and third can be solved by introducing Git into the project.
Setting up an SSH login without a password
Of course, web interfaces are convenient, beautiful, and functional, but damn, they are very difficult to automate. Of course, you could use selenium, but why if you can write a regular Python or bash/powershell script?
The ideal solution to this problem is SSH access to the server. I am 100% sure that you, my reader, know what a terminal is and how to work with it.
By default, a password is required to access the server. But introducing it every time is a real pain in the ***. Therefore, we will configure access to the server through the generated key pair. One for the local machine, the other for the server.
Let's generate a pair.
When asked to enter a key name, enter the full path to it + the key name
When asked to enter a password and other things, do not enter anything.
After generating the key, go to the directory where the key was generated.
Copy the public key to the target server.
You should now be able to log in without entering a password.
Implementation of Git technology. Its practical use.
I combined two problems into one because both of them can be solved by integrating one single version control technology, and I’m talking about git.
This tool takes care of tracking all changed, deleted, and added files. Also, if you need to roll back changes, just run the appropriate command.
I'm not going to tell you all the features of working with git. But I will show you the minimum that is necessary to easily and quickly update the project. Spoiler, literally, 3 commands.
Initializing Git on a local, home machine/computer.
First, we initialize an empty repository.
Create a repository on GitHub and copy the link of the repository.
Add a copied link.
Where REF_NAME is any name of your link
Adding files.
Creating the first commit
Sending changes to the server for the first time
REF_NAME is the name of your link, which you named three steps ago.
BRANCH_NAME is the name of the branch, the default is master
Cloning a Git repository already on the server
After logging into the server, 3 commands left to remember
To create a local copy on the server
Go to the directory of the local copy of the repository.
To update the project
Conclusion
This is how I deploy my Telegram bots on servers. All my bots that I publish here have their own github repository, and in these repositories, you can find corresponding examples of launch scripts and services (daemons).
I hope this article helped you deploy your first Telegram bot. Bye.
