1. New Technology Meetup Derby 1: Bots and Clouds Wifi: iHub
@andyelastacloud

2. About me Andy Cross, Microsoft Azure MVP & Regional Director
Co-Founder of Elastacloud
Background in Web & “internet scale” challenges
UK Azure User Group
IoT Innovators
Cloud Infrastructure User Group
New Technology Meetup
@andyelastacloud

3. I do not work for Microsoft
I do have a bunch of experience with their technology and find it a convenient sharing platform.
If things sound vendor specific, they can almost always be reapplied elsewhere.
If things seem hard when I do them and you have experience of it being easier elsewhere, always shout out. We’re blinkered by the things we can reach.
I do work for Elastacloud
We’re polycloud, polyglot and polymath. We build data solutions and innovative user interfaces.
We’re based in this office.
We’re hiring.
We’re paying for the beer.
@andyelastacloud

4. About this Run by a board; member applicants welcome Our mission
To build a leading technology community and support their innovations using cutting edge technologies.
Targeting monthly meetings on new technology.
opinionated change advocacy
champion
member oriented
vendor agnostic
@andyelastacloud

5. 1; Bots and Clouds
A new metaphor for engaging users
@andyelastacloud

6. What’s a bot? What’s a cloud?
Bots participate in conversations
Conversational platforms are web oriented
Modern chat services integrate with many services
On more recent integration is to support conversation agents, or bots
Clouds support web platforms
Scalable and elastic
Serverless and economic
A developer’s best friend
Not this
@andyelastacloud

7. @andyelastacloud

8. Who supports bots? Messenger Apps Team Apps Productivity Apps
Facebook Messenger
Kik
Telegram
Skype
SMS
GroupMe
Team Apps
Slack
Productivity Apps
The bot movement started with Messenger Apps; adding a Bot into a conversation; primarily used on mobile devices, and a way for brands to participate in the ecosystem
@andyelastacloud

9. Why are bots taking off?
Engagement
@andyelastacloud

10. Why are bots interesting for a business?
Active users respond to messages within 20 seconds of receiving a message.
Passive users take minutes to respond to a message.
Roughly 20 percent of Kik usage is active and 80 percent is passive.
The 40 percent of U.S. teens who use the app on average take part in six chat sessions a day, each 12 minutes long.
@andyelastacloud

11. Why are bots interesting for a dev?
Ever wanted to write an app but the UI got in the way?
In a bot context your input/output is English (or language)
The technology areas are futuristic:
AI – with ML for NLP
Web tech (which we will present today around Cloud) – without the css ;-)
Modern data access
More direct access to user interaction
@andyelastacloud

12. Prime-Cloud-Scenario
Some major post-cloud explosion example trends
Big Data:
Cloud oriented, Server Abstracted, Job as a Service, REST based
Containerized:
Docker as a service, Server Abstracted, Isolation of monoliths, REST hosts
CloudDevOps:
Infrastructure as Code, Setup Abstractions, scalable, REST + more
Bots:
Serverless, elastic, REST based, polyglot
@andyelastacloud

13. Bot Design Using Microsoft’s BotFramework (botbuilder)
@andyelastacloud

14. Bot Builder SDK (Node.js + C#)
Your bot
Logic
Web service
Bot Builder SDK (Node.js + C#)
Your conversation logic
LUIS
@andyelastacloud

15. Send/receive messages
Bot Connector
Dev portal
Bot Connector
Send/receive messages
Store state
Translation
Telemetry …
Your bot
@andyelastacloud

16. Bot Connector messages
Your bot
Bot Connector {
"type": "Message",
"id": "68YrxgtB53Y",
"conversationId": "DphPaFQrDuZDKyCez4AFGcT4vy5aQDje1lLGIjB8v18MFtb",
"language": "en",
"text": "You can say \"/order\" to order!",
"attachments": [ ],
"from": {
"name": " ",
"channelId": "sms",
"address": " ",
"id": "Ro52hKN287",
"isBot": false },
"channelData": { SMS data here },
"botUserData": { your data here },
... }
@andyelastacloud

17. Azure Design Bot App A Deploy Channels Bot Framework Azure WebApp Or
Azure Function
Azure SQL Db
3rd party services
@andyelastacloud

18. Bot Design A new type of design; conversationalist
Bots aren’t meant to be opinionated
Bots are servants and must be service
Bot must ask a question, pretty much at the end of every action.

19. Demo; bot scaffold!
A festival of demonstration and potential failure with a back beat of swearing

20. Demo; bot hosting!

21. Demo; AI

22. Summary

23. Bots are good
Bots are easy to put together with the botbuilder framework.
Typescript rocks
AI rocks
Best practises:
Always ask a question to be a good conversationalist.