Viber messenger channel

Allows to create chatbots for Viber.

Built on top of Viber REST API

How to use

1. Include Viber dependency to your build.gradle

implementation("com.just-ai.jaicf:viber:$jaicfVersion")

Replace $jaicfVersion with the latest version

2. Use Viber request and reactions in your scenarios’ actions

action {
    // Viber incoming event
    val incomingEvent = request.viber?.event

    // Get sender
    val sender = incomingEvent?.sender

    // Use Viber-specified response builders
    reactions.viber?.location(23.243, 45.555)
    reactions.viber?.sticker(40127)
    reactions.viber?.inlineButtons {
        row("1", "2", "3")
        redirect("google.com", "https://google.com")
    }

    // Or use standard response builders
    reactions.say("Hello there!")
    reactions.image("https://address.com/image.jpg")
}

Note that Viber bot works asynchronously. This means that every reaction method sends a response to the user.

Refer to the ViberReactions class to learn more about available response builders.

Native API

You can use native Viber API directly via reactions.viber?.viberApi. This enables you to fetch some data from Viber REST API, for example getOnlineStatus.

action {
    reactions.viber?.run {
        viberApi.getOnlineStatus(listOf("01234567890="), authToken)
    }
}

Learn more about available API methods here.

3. Create a new bot in Viber

Create a new account for your bot as described here. Copy your new bot’s access token to the clipboard.

4. Create and run Viber channel

Using JAICP

For local development:

fun main() {
    JaicpPollingConnector(
        botApi = viberTestBot,
        accessToken = "your JAICF project token",
        channels = listOf(
            ViberChannel.Factory()
        )
    ).runBlocking()
}

For JAICP Cloud production:

fun main() {
    JaicpServer(
        botApi = helloWorldBot,
        accessToken = "your JAICF project token",
        channels = listOf(
            ViberChannel.Factory()
        )
    ).start(wait = true)
}

Or locally using Ktor:

fun main() {
    val viber = ViberChannel(
        viberTestBot,
        ViberBotConfig(
            botName = "<your_bot_name>",
            authToken = "<your_auth_token>"
        )
    )

    val server = GlobalScope.async {
        val server: NettyApplicationEngine = embeddedServer(Netty, 8000) {
            routing {
                httpBotRouting("/" to viber)
            }
        }
        server.start(wait = true)
    }

    viber.initWebhook("<your_webhook_url>") // Enter your url
    server.await()
}

Note that you need to init webhook after start your server. Obtain a public URL for your webhook (using ngrok for example).

Events

Your bot can also receive events from users, such as Contact, Location, etc. These messages contain non-text queries and can be handled in your scenarios via event activators.

state("events") {
    activators {
        event(ViberEvent.CONTACT_MESSAGE)
        event(ViberEvent.STICKER_MESSAGE)
    }

    action {
        val location = request.viber?.location
        val contact = request.viber?.contact
    }
}

Learn more about available incoming events here.

Buttons

Viber allows sending keyboards. You can use DSL for creating keyboards.

action {
    reactions.say("Click on the button below")
    reactions.viber?.keyboard {
        row("1", "2", "3")
        redirect("google.com", "https://google.com")
    }
}

You can specify style for keyboard buttons.

action {
    val style = ViberButton.Style(backgroundColor = "#fdebd0", textSize = Size.LARGE)
    reactions.viber?.keyboard(style) {
        row {
            reply("1", "one")
            redirect("google", "https://google.com")
        }
    }
}

Or assign your style to the default style of keyboard buttons.

ViberReactions.keyboardDefaultStyle = ViberButton.Style(backgroundColor = "#fdebd0", textSize = Size.LARGE)

You can also send inline buttons. Although they are not supported by Viber directly, the framework can use RichMediaObject to emulate them. Inline buttons you can send without any other message.

action {
    reactions.viber?.inlineButtons {
        row {
            reply("1", "one")
            redirect("google", "https://google.com")
        }
    }
}

Inline buttons default style can be set using inlineButtonsDefaultStyle in ViberReactions.

For more example you can learn the example scenario.