[](https://travis-ci.org/BlakeWilliams/Elixir-Slack)
# Elixir-Slack
This is a work in progress Slack [Real Time Messaging API] client for Elixir.
You'll need a Slack API token which can be retrieved from the [Web API page] or
by creating a new [bot integration].
[Real time Messaging API]: https://api.slack.com/rtm
[Web API page]: https://api.slack.com/web
[bot integration]: https://my.slack.com/services/new/bot
## Installing
Add Slack to your `mix.exs` `application` and `dependencies` methods. You'll
also need [websocket_client] since hex.pm doesn't install git based
dependencies.
[websocket_client]: https://github.com/jeremyong/websocket_client
```elixir
def application do
[applications: [:logger, :slack]]
end
def deps do
[{:slack, "~> 0.7.0"},
{:websocket_client, git: "https://github.com/jeremyong/websocket_client"}]
end
```
## RTM Usage
Define a module that uses the Slack behaviour and defines the appropriate
callback methods.
```elixir
defmodule SlackRtm do
use Slack
def handle_connect(slack) do
IO.puts "Connected as #{slack.me.name}"
end
def handle_message(message = %{type: "message"}, slack) do
send_message("I got a message!", message.channel, slack)
end
def handle_message(_,_), do: :ok
def handle_info({:message, text, channel}, slack) do
IO.puts "Sending your message, captain!"
send_message(text, channel, slack)
{:ok, state}
end
def handle_info(_, _), do: :ok
end
```
To run this example, you'll also want to call `SlackRtm.start_link("token", [])`
and run the project with `mix run --no-halt`.
You can send messages to channels using `send_message/3` which takes the message
as the first argument, channel/user as the second, and the passed in `slack`
state as the third.
The passed in `slack` state holds the current user properties as `me`, team
properties as `team`, the current websocket connection as `socket`, and a list
of `bots`, `channels`, `groups`, `users`, and `ims` (direct message channels).
[rtm.start]: https://api.slack.com/methods/rtm.start
If you want to do things like trigger the sending of messages outside of your
Slack handlers, you can leverage the `handle_info/2` callback to implement an
external API.
This allows you to not just respond to Slack RTM events, but programmatically
control Slack from your Elixir runtime:
```elixir
{:ok, rtm} = SlackRtm.start_link("token", [])
send rtm, {:message, "External message", "general"}
#=> {:message, "External message", "#general"}
#==> Sending your message, captain!
```
Slack has *a lot* of message types so it's a good idea to define a callback like
above where unhandled message types don't crash your application. You can find a
list of message types and examples on the [RTM API page].
You can find more detailed documentation on the [Slack hexdocs
page][documentation].
[RTM API page]: https://api.slack.com/rtm
## Web API Usage
The complete Slack Web API is implemented by generating modules/functions from
the JSON documentation. You can view this project's [documentation] for more
details.
There are two ways to authenticate your API calls. You can configure `api_token`
on `slack` that will authenticate all calls to the API automatically.
```elixir
config :slack, api_token: "VALUE"
```
Alternatively you can pass in `%{token: "VALUE"}` to any API call in
`optional_params`. This also allows you to override the configured `api_token`
value if desired.
Quick example, getting the names of everyone on your team:
```elixir
names = Slack.Web.Users.list(%{token: "TOKEN_HERE"})
|> Map.get("members")
|> Enum.map(fn(member) ->
member["real_name"]
end)
```
[documentation]: http://hexdocs.pm/slack/
