FAQ

What's this?

Dithcord is a library for making modular Discord bots. It's mainly developed for dithcord-tui and dithcord-gui but it's absolutely usable for any kind of bot.

How is Dithcord (the library) different fron Lispcord?

The main difference is that Lispcord supports running several monolithic bots in the same lisp-system while Dithcord supports running a single modular bot. If either suits you then you should probably pick Lispcord to avoid an extra layer you don't need. Dithcord is not a complete abstraction and you'll have to use Lispcord functions anyway.

Also, Lispcord is more imperative while Dithcord is more declarative with all the define-stuff macros.

What's with the lisp?

Well, both Dithcord and Lispcord have lots of it.

Dithcord (the library)

Since the current code is in such a state that it probably shouldn't have been published yet this section contains very little.

Example

More are in the examples directory.

(in-package dithcord-user)

;; Define a bot named ECHO-BOT with one module ECHO
;; Modules are not loaded until the bot is started
(define-bot echo-bot (echo)
  ;; Parameters are evaluated. You can load it from a config file e.g.
  :token "")

;; Define a module ECHO with no dependencies.
;; Lispcord is always available without any modules.
(define-module echo ())

;; Define a handler for event :ON-MODULE-LOAD handled by the module ECHO.
;; Dithcord has some special events and the rest (like :on-message-create) are the same as Lispcord's
(define-handler echo :on-module-load ()
  (v:info :echo-bot "ECHO loaded!"))

;; Define another handler for :ON-MESSAGE-CREATE
(define-handler echo :on-message-create (msg)
  ;; This code is from Lispcord's example
  (unless (lc:botp (lc:author msg))
    (let ((cmd (string-trim " " (lispcord:remove-mention (lispcord:me) (lc:content msg)))))
      (when (eql 0 (search "echo!" cmd))
        (lispcord:reply msg (subseq cmd 6))))))

;; Start the bot
(start-bot 'echo-bot)

Special events

:on-module-load - Called when the module is loaded into the bot after the module's dependencies are loaded. The connection may not exist. Use :on-ready to do stuff when re/connected.

:on-module-unload - Called when the module is unloaded from a bot, either because the bot is redefined without this module or because the bot is being stopped.