Telegram Bot WordPress Plugin Boilerplate

A scalable and advanced WordPress boilerplate plugin for connecting a Telegram bot to your website.

v3.3.0 (Changelog)

Libraries used: PHP Telegram Bot

Requirements

• PHP: 8.0 or higher
• WordPress: 5.0 or higher
• Composer: For dependency management

Installation

Clone or download this repository, and then you'll need to do a four-step CASE-SENSITIVE find and replace in all the codes:

1. Search for TelegramPluginBoilerplate to capture the namespaces.
2. Search for FDTBWPB to capture the constants.
3. Search for fdtbwpb to capture option name and slugs.
4. Search for telegram-plugin-boilerplate to capture the text domains.

Then, update the header in plugin.php with your own information.

Composer Setup

AFTER you have done the find and replace, run this command in the plugin root:

$ composer install

Bot Setup

Create Bot

Create a bot with @BotFather and copy the token.

Plugin setup

1. Enable the plugin
2. Copy bot's token and username (with @) in the plugin's settings
3. Open the options-permalink.php page so that the API endpoints get refreshed

Use getUpdates method (Local)

To test the bot on a local environment, add this constant to your wp-config.php file:

define('WP_ENVIRONMENT_TYPE', 'local');

And use this endpoint to handle the updates (e.g. each time you message the bot):

https://{WEBSITE.COM}/wp-json/fdtbwpb/v1/get-message-polling

Set Webhook (Production)

To enable your bot for a production website, set the bot's webhook to the get-message endpoint:

https://api.telegram.org/bot{TOKEN}/setWebhook?url=https://{WEBSITE.COM}/wp-json/fdtbwpb/v1/get-message

Redirect requests (proxy)

If your server can't access Telegram, you can use a middleman server to redirect requests:

• Change CURLOPT_URL's value in forward.php
• Upload forward.php and forward-to-telegram.php to your middleman server
• Use forward's URL as bot's webhook
• Copy the forward-to-telegram's full link in the plugin's settings

Debugging

You can see bot's error log file here:

wp-content/plugins/telegram-plugin-boilerplate/logs/

More Examples and Documentation

You can find more examples and sample codes/methods/classes in the base WordPress Plugin Boilerplate repository.

Translating the Plugin

1. Open terminal in the plugin root, and run this command to generate the POT file with WP-CLI:

$ wp i18n make-pot . languages/telegram-plugin-boilerplate.pot

2. Create translations with PoEdit:

   • Open PoEdit and choose "Create new translation" or "New from POT file".
   • Select languages/telegram-plugin-boilerplate.pot.
   • Choose your target language locale, for example de_DE for German.
   • Translate each string.
   • Save the file as languages/telegram-plugin-boilerplate-de_DE.po.
   • PoEdit will automatically generate languages/telegram-plugin-boilerplate-de_DE.mo.

3. Keep translations up to date:

   • After adding or changing strings, regenerate the POT file.
   • Reopen the updated POT in PoEdit and choose "Update from POT file" to update your translations.

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file for details.