Discord.js Template

.DISCORD_TUTORIAL.MD

Tutorial for Discord.js (a.k.a. How to Make Your Own Discord Bot)

Note: I'm busy as of writing this and this tutorial is not complete. Whatever state this file is in, please remember to add a .gitignore and hide config.json in it. config.json will contain your API keys for Discord! If this is comprimised, others may have access to your bot and how it responds with commands.

To register your soon-to-be bot with Discord, go to their developer portal and create a new app. Give it a name at the very least. Click 'Create App.' On the next screen, click 'Create a Bot User.' Note the values Client ID, Client Secret, and Token.

I recommend creating a bot testing server in Discord to test out your bot without disturbing others. Plus, you'll be guarenteed the permissions needed to add a bot to your server. Add your client ID to the URL https://discordapp.com/oauth2/authorize?client_id=[CLIENT_ID]&permissions=0&scope=bot where specified and go to the link. Sign into Discord and add your bot to the server you wish.

If you have a git folder, I recommend making a folder in there and naming it after your project. If you're not using git, make a folder anyway. Put the files on this page in your folder. This will be refered to as the project folder from now on.

If you have Atom, I recommend using that for the project, however if you have another preference, feel free to use it. Open your project folder in Atom and open the config.json file. Replace the placeholder text (YOUR_TOKEN for example) with their respective values from the developer portal. Token is a mandatory and your program will not run without a valid token. Make sure you do not remove the quotes.

Navigate to it using your terminal and use npm init. Package name can be your bot's name. Version can be left blank. Add a short description. Entry point, for this tutorial, should be app.js. Test command is node app.js. Git repository, keywords, and license can be left blank. Author should be your GitHub username or first name. When it asks you to confirm, type y for yes. Then, type npm install --save discord.js.

With these steps completed, type node app.js into your terminal. Make sure that you've navigated to your project folder before running this. If see see Logged in as [YOUR_USERNAME], your code works and your bot is online! Your bot will only be online as long as this window is open/process is running. Using control-C will end the process. If you are interested in keeping this running 24/7, consider using a dedicated computer, such as a Raspberry Pi, or using EC2 through AWS.

To create a command for your bot, open app.js in your prefered text editor. In the if statement, replace YOUR_PREFIX with the prefix you'd like to create. This is typically done by taking the first letter of your bot's name and appending some form of punctuation. For example, Tatsumaki Bot, a popular bot, uses t! and t@ (for moderation commands). You should make sure your prefix does not use a popular bot's prefix as the user may recieve multiple responses from multiple bots.

Next, think of a command. For this tutorial, a simple build command will be used. Replace COMMAND in the switch statement with build. Make sure you do not use any capitals for your command, because line 14 converts the user's message to all lower-case for user-friendly parsing. Within this case block, type msg.channel.send("Build: " + build + "");. This finds the channel the message was sent with (msg.channel) and uses the send() method to send the string in the parameter to that channel. Save your code and run it by using node app.js (Use control-C to end your process if your bot is still running). In Discord, go to the server you added your bot to earlier, and type [YOUR_PREFIX]build. For example, I would type a!build for my bot.

A switch statement is used because when enough commands have been added, if statements tend to clutter up code. While switch statements make it a bit harder to create commands that require the includes() method, I prefer it for aesthetic purposes. A series of if statements may be used if prefered.

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.gitignore

# dependencies
/node_modules
package.json

# System Files
.DS_Store

# API Keys
config.json

app.js

const Discord = require("discord.js");
var config = require('./config.json');
const client = new Discord.Client();

const build = "0.0.1"; // Change with each update

client.on('ready', () => {
  console.log(`Logged in as ${client.user.username}!`);
  console.log("Build: " + build);
});

client.on('message', msg => {
  if (msg.content.toLowerCase().substring(0, 2) == `YOUR_PREFIX`) { // Replace YOUR_PREFIX with something like a!
    switch (msg.content.toLowerCase().substring(2)) {
      case `COMMAND`: // Add your commands here
        break;
    }}});

client.login(config.TOKEN);

function getRandomInt(min, max) {
  return Math.floor(Math.random() * (max - min + 1)) + min;
}

function setGame(game) {
  console.log("Set current game to " + game);
  client.user.setPresence({
    status: 'online',
    game: {
      name: game
    }
  });
}

config.json

{
  "CLIENT_ID" : "YOUR_CLIENT_ID",
  "CLIENT_SECRET" : "YOUR_CLIENT_SECRET",
  "TOKEN" : "YOUR_TOKEN"
}

Note to anyone following this tiny guide: don't check in config.json if you decide to use version control, or whenever you share the code someone would know your bot token. Anyone can make their own bot and connect your app here to their bot, so there will never be a need to check it in.