The Rise Of The Bots

@asyncjs - Alex Nicol @nicol_alexandre - #RiseOfTheBots
riseofthebots.webnicol.fr

Table of Contents

  1. What is a bot?

  2. Chatbots vs Mobile app

  3. Hands on

Me

Alex Nicol - webnicol.fr - @nicol_alexandre
Developer @ EDF Energy R&D UK Centre
Web / Mobile / AR / Bots

What is a bot?

bots

Bots are seen by some as "a sophisticated, artificial-intelligence-infused creation, capable of human interaction"

Wired UK.
bots

Chatbot: Automated agent/program that mimic human conversation, potentially using AI.

bots
bots

A bit of history

The first one: Eliza

bots

Virtual assistants

Google Now / Google assistant

Siri

Alexa

Cortana

Natural Language Processing

"NLP is a way for computers to analyze, understand, and derive meaning from human language in a smart and useful way."

http://blog.algorithmia.com/introduction-natural-language-processing-nlp/

NLP/NLU Services

Rasa NLU

wit.ai

api.ai

Amazon Lex

...

Advantages

24/7 Availability

No queues

Asynchronous conversation

Excellent to do simple repetitive task

Minimalist UI

New communication channel

Chatbots vs Mobile app

wired

http://www.wired.co.uk/article/here-come-the-bots

Mobile app usage in 2016 (1/2)

wired https://www.comscore.com/Insights/Presentations-and-Whitepapers/2016/The-2016-US-Mobile-App-Report

Mobile app usage in 2016 (2/2)

wired https://www.comscore.com/Insights/Presentations-and-Whitepapers/2016/The-2016-US-Mobile-App-Report

And, loads of messaging apps

Kik

WeChat

Facebook Messenger

Google Allo

Telegram

Skype

Slack

(SMS)

kikbots

The internet is always evolving

Browser + Website

Smartphone OS + Mobile app

Messaging platform + Chatbots

Conversational UI/UX

wired

Facebook wants to be the new "OS"

In-app browsing

Instant article

Games

Texts and Calls in Messenger

Messenger Bots

Facebook Messenger Bot API

  • • Text
    • Audio
    • Image
    • Video
    • File
  • Templates:
    • List
    • Receipt
    • Button
    • Airline
  • Buttons:
    • Url
    • Call
    • Buy
    • Share
  • • Webview
    • Instant article
    • Log In/Out (OAuth2)
    • Quick replies
    • Menu
https://developers.facebook.com/docs/messenger-platform

As a developer

No responsive design that need to match 947163 size of Android Screens

No Apple certificates/provisioning profile/ @£$*^%$£

Brand design guidelines, what?

NLP/NLU is really satisfying

UI != UX

HANDS ON!

Let's create a Weather Station Bot!

wired

Requirements:

JavaScript / Node.js basic knowledge

A node.js server (or lambda)

A api.ai account

A facebook account

api.ai - Create your character:

Entities

Intents

Context

Domains (fulfillment)

Facebook

create a page

create an app

https://www.facebook.com/pages/create/
https://developers.facebook.com

Link your facebook app to your server

Repeat bot

Link facebook and api.ai

Get data from the weather stations

Quick reply

Landing page

Get started

Menu

And a lot more todo

Get the code and the Api.ai agent

github.com/alexandrenicol/WeatherStationBot

Want to use Slack, go ahead:

https://api.slack.com/

https://github.com/howdyai/botkit

What about an Alexa skill?

https://developer.amazon.com/alexa-skills-kit

https://github.com/alexa/alexa-skills-kit-sdk-for-nodejs

Reminders

• Don't lie, let your users know they're talking to a bot
• Handle errors, let your users know if it fails
• If needed, handover the query
• Create a character for your bot, but don't give them multiple personalities
• Keep it simple
• Listen to your users, and improve their experience
• Not everything can be bot-ed
• We're not good at doing repetitive tasks, we're good at experimenting, trying, failing, and that's how we learn

Thank you.