roleypoly

a discord bot & web ui for managing self-assignable roles.

Most likely, you'll want to go here: https://rp.kat.cafe. This app is already hosted, you don't need to deal with deploying it or anything, I've already done it for you.

If you're here to report a bug or develop on Roleypoly, the rest of this document is for you.

Roleypoly is built with node.js, next.js, react/redux, discord.js, and little sprinkles of weird magic goo.

developing/running your own

you'll need

• a discord app and bot token
• a node environment (maybe?)
• a docker environment
• a hard hat because it's time to go building!

Check .env.example for all the various possible configuration values. Roleypoly is configured entirely over environment variables. In development, you might want to copy .env.example to .env so you don't need to set this up in your shell.

for developers

docker-compose up -d
yarn
yarn dev

tooling notes:

• we use flow-type, and in development, it is ideally transparent.
• ./ui has hot-reloading via next.js
• ./api and ./rpc have hot-reloading built in.
  • if this isn't ideal for you, set NO_HOT_RELOADING=1

this backend framework is one i've been building on for a long time and has a shitload of magic and auto-importing involved. for the most part, unless you make a new Service class, you do not need to define it's import anywhere.

there is websocket stuff, but i don't use it anywhere. if you have a good use, go for it... but scalability was not in mind. it may be at some point.

A tour

• Roleypoly.js is the main app
• index.js is the setup code, does some things that the app doesn't ever need to care about.
• api folder includes most routing. Most of these may be phased out into the new RPC system, but it does not solve everything, so this will exist into eternity.
• rpc folder includes magically imported RPC routes. generally, if it exists here, it's callable from client code as-is, sans the first argument. function return is 1:1 what it'll spit out on client.
• services folder is various services, such as Discord, Sessions, and other data-fetcher/sorter classes. Most of these are on AppContext.
• models folder is magically imported sequelize model files.
• ui is the Next.js app. This is operationally unable to parse anything outside of it's root, so shared libs must be non-transpiled, non-flowtyped JS code, luckily this is rarely ever needed.

for production

If you want an unedited latest version of roleypoly, it is available on the Docker Hub (katie/roleypoly) for your using pleasure. An example docker-compose.yml is provided in docker-compose.example.yml, and all relevant environment variables (see .env.example) may be set there.

If you're not into Docker and/or want to deploy your own, simply run

yarn build
yarn start

and you're off to the production races (sort of, you'll want to set up a .env file.)

The relevant Dockerfile is also included, so docker build is a useful way to deploy this too.

scope & goal of project

I wanted to create a bot that let servers fully express theirselves through roles. the primary goal is clear in that regard, and it started with a (desktop-only) web experience. originally, a command-based bot wasn't on the menu, but i've likened up to the idea; but the single requirement is it must work in a fuzzy-match situation.

One of the biggest problems I set out to solve was the problem of emojis. Discord supports them and bots try to, but the fact of the matter is, not every bot treats emojis as first class citizens; and users can't really remember roles either. The problem is fine with 10 roles that are easy to remember and explain. This is impossible to manage with 250, Discord's cap on roles.

The primary goal, all-in-all, is to provide the single, best, end-all user experience for a bot that manages roles; until Discord gives us this theirselves.

— kayteh

need help? wanna help us?

If you need any help, please join our discord. That is the best way to contact the developers.

If your server needs something in particular to accomodate your server's requirements of user-assignable roles, please reach out to me over DMs on Discord, or email at roleypoly@kat.cafe

If you'd like to give us incentive to continue developing and hosting this bot, please consider supporting it through Patreon, or via PayPal. All support is extremely appreciated, and not required for the use of the service.