Summary

Server administration is an activity that often happens in an isolated context in a terminal. ChatOps is a way of bringing that work into a shared environment and unlocking more collaboration. This week Jacob Tomlinson talks about the work he has done on opsdroid, a new bot framework targeted at tying together the various services and environments that modern production systems rely on.

Preface

• Hello and welcome to Podcast.__init__, the podcast about Python and the people who make it great.
• I would like to thank everyone who supports us on Patreon. Your contributions help to make the show sustainable.
• When you’re ready to launch your next project you’ll need somewhere to deploy it. Check out Linode at www.podastinit.com/linode?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss and get a $20 credit to try out their fast and reliable Linux virtual servers for running your awesome app.
• Need to learn more about how to scale your apps or learn new techniques for building them? Pluralsight has the training and mentoring you need to level up your skills. Go to www.pythonpodcast.com/pluralsight?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss to start your free trial today.
• Visit the site to subscribe to the show, sign up for the newsletter, read the show notes, and get in touch.
• To help other people find the show please leave a review on iTunes, or Google Play Music, tell your friends and co-workers, and share it on social media.
• If you work with data for your job or want to learn more about how open source is powering the latest innovations in data science then make your way to the Open Data Science Conference, happening in London in October and San Francisco in November. Follow the links in the show notes to register and help support the show in the process.
• Your host as usual is Tobias Macey and today I’m interviewing Jacob Tomlinson about opsdroid

Interview

• Introductions
• How did you get introduced to Python?
• What is opsdroid and what was the problem that you were trying to solve when you started the project?
• What led you to choose Python as the language for implementing opsdroid?
• What did you find lacking in the multitude of other chat bots that necessitated starting a new project? (e.g. Hubot, Errbot, Lita)
• One of the main features that you list in the documentation is the ease of installation. Why is that such an important aspect of the project and how is that implemented?
• What has been the most interesting and the most challenging aspect of implementing opsdroid?
• On the opsdroid organisation on GitHub there are many repositories for plugin modules. Do you see this being a management issue in the long term?
• How is opsdroid architected and what were the system requirements that led to the current system design?
• How do you manage authorization and authentication for performing commands against your production infrastructure in a group chat environment?
  • What are some of the other security implications that users should be aware of when deploying a bot for interfacing with their deployment environment?
• How does a chat-oriented bot framework differ from those that are being created for voice-oriented interaction?
• What do you have planned for the future of opsdroid?

Keep In Touch

• Website
• @_JacobTomlinson on Twitter
• jacobtomlinson on GitHub

Picks

• Tobias
  • Rough Translation Podcast
• Jacob
  • Home Assistant Podcast

Links

• Iron Man Movie
• Puppet
• Hubot
• ChatOps
• asyncio
• Home Assistant
  • Podcast.init Interview
• api.ai
• Luis
• Lex
• Slack
• Mycroft
• Kalliope
• Amazon Alexa
• opsdroid audio
• Snowboy
• Google Home
• Wit.ai

The intro and outro music is from Requiem for a Fish The Freak Fandango Orchestra / CC BY-SA