Github commit messages to Skype chat bot

Asked 13/9, 2011 at 19:58 Answered 31/7, 2012 at 11:55

I'd like to have a bot which sends Skype chat notifications for Github commits.

I didn't find Skype in Github project admin hooks. Any idea where I should start looking examples?

Klein answered 13/9, 2011 at 19:58 Comment(5)

skype is and will be a close source protocol application – Handsomely 13/9, 2011 at 20:3

@Ulterior: we even have people posting Windows programming questions here (shudder). developer.skype.com – Abigailabigale 13/9, 2011 at 20:15

@Abigailabigale Thanks, last time I checked, there was a hacked protocol project to connect to skype network as a node – Handsomely 13/9, 2011 at 20:21

Thank you for the comments. We have been using Skype with monitoring solutions and such and I know Github is using it internally. You can run Skype the binary on the server-side on Linux server (you don't need even have Windows...). Skype has standard API and you can communicate with it over DBUS. The part I am missing is somekind of script that reads Github and pushes messages over to Skype process. – Klein 14/9, 2011 at 9:48

@Ulterior: you don't need the source to use the Skype API. developer.skype.com/public-api-reference – Tapdance 1/11, 2011 at 7:55

Now here is a solution:

https://github.com/opensourcehacker/sevabot

Klein answered 31/7, 2012 at 11:55 Comment(0)

We looked at similar integration recently and decided that the Skype API terms are overly restrictive and therefore our effort would be better spent moving to and building tools to integrate with other chat clients.

Consider for example:

4.2 Without limiting the generality of the foregoing, you shall ensure that Your Software Application or Hardware Device (as applicable):

(vii) does not attempt to send messages or place calls to or communicate with other users of Skype Software unless specifically directed to do so by the user;

(x) does not solicit, collect, store, cache or otherwise obtain access to the Skype Credentials or to proxy authentication credentials for the purposes of automating logins to Skype User Accounts.

You might be able to ignore those restrictions for an internal tool but it's a share to not be able to distribute the results of your work and I think that's part of why you may not see great third party integrations with Skype chat.

Bik answered 1/11, 2011 at 8:25 Comment(2)

I might be missing the point here, but how you cannot share the work? Every user will launch their own skype instance on their own server where the bot then connects? – Klein 2/11, 2011 at 1:7

While technically feasible my point is that I do not see a reasonable way to implement even simple status reporting bots while conforming to the API terms and therefore distributing such a tool could become problematic. While I find the suggestion that you can "license" access to an API highly questionable I'm reluctant to commit my time or the future of an otherwise fun project to arguing with the Skype/Microsoft legal team about it. Perhaps you won't find my concerns to be a problem. – Bik 2/11, 2011 at 5:14

I'm looking for a very similar thing. You can possibly write a script to use the Skype4Java or Skype4Py wrappers for the Skype API

Skype itself is a proprietary protocol but you can interact with it. The only way to interface with skype at present is through a plugin for their client, using the API as mentioned.

I believe the API also works for version 4.

Mulberry answered 1/11, 2011 at 7:51 Comment(1)

Do you know whether Skype4Py is maintained and works with the latest Linux Skype versions? In some point it was non maintained AFAIK. And as far as I understood the communication with skype the binary over dbus. – Klein 2/11, 2011 at 1:9

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