Rasa Webchat 💬

A chat widget to deploy virtual assistants made with Rasa or Botfront on any website.

Features Text Messages Quick Replies Images and Videos Markdown support Persistent sessions Typing indications Smart delay between messages Easy to import in a script tag or as a React Component

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Usage

In a <script> tag

In your <body/>:

<div id="webchat"/>
<script src="https://storage.googleapis.com/mrbot-cdn/webchat-latest.js"></script>
// Or you can replace latest with a specific version
<script>
  WebChat.default.init({
    selector: "#webchat",
    initPayload: "/get_started",
    customData: {"language": "en"}, // arbitrary custom data. Stay minimal as this will be added to the socket
    socketUrl: "http://localhost:5500",
    socketPath: "/socket.io/",
    title: "Title",
    subtitle: "Subtitle",
  })
</script>

About images: width and height define the size in pixels that images in messages are crop-scaled to. If not present, the image will scale to the maximum width of the container and the image.

It is recommended to use a particular version (i.e. "webchat-.js") however the file "webchat-latest.js" is also available and is updated continuously with the latest version.

As a React component

Install the package from GitHub by running:

npm install rasa-webchat

Then once it is installed it can be implemented as follows.

import { Widget } from 'rasa-webchat';

function CustomWidget = () => {
  return (
    <Widget
      initPayload={"/get_started"}
      socketUrl={"http://localhost:5500"}
      socketPath={"/socket.io/"}
      customData={{"language": "en"}} // arbitrary custom data. Stay minimal as this will be added to the socket
      title={"Title"}
    />
  )
}

• Make sure to have the prop embedded set to true if you don't want to see the launcher.

Parameters

Prop / Param	Default value	Description
initPayload	null	Payload sent to Rasa when conversation starts
socketUrl	null	Socket URL
socketPath	null	Close the chat window
customData	null	Arbitrary object sent with the socket. If using with Botfront, it must include the language (e.g. {"language": "en"})
docViewer	false	If you add this prop to the component or to the init script, docViewer=true , this will treat links in received messages as links to a document ( .pdf .doc .xlsx etc. ) and will open them in a popup using https://docs.google.com/viewer service
title	'Welcome"	Title shown in the header of the widget
subtitle	null	Subtitle shown under the title in the header of the widget
inputTextFieldHint	"Type a message"	User message input field placeholder
hideWhenNotConnected	true	If true the widget will hide when the connection to the socket is lost
connectOn	"mount"	This prop lets you choose when the widget will try connecting to the server. By default, it tries connecting as soon as it mounts. If you select connectOn='open' it will only attempt connection when the widget is opened. it can only take the values mount and open.
onSocketEvent	null	call custom code on a specific socket event
embedded	false	Set to true if you want to embed the in a web page. The widget will always be open and the initPayload will be triggered immediately
showFullScreenButton	false	Show a full screen toggle
displayUnreadCount	false	Path to an image displayed on the launcher when the widget is closed
showMessageDate	false	Show message date. Can be overriden with a function: (timestamp, message) => return 'my custom date'
customMessageDelay	See below	This prop is a function, the function take a message string as an argument. The defined function will be called everytime a message is received and the returned value will be used as a milliseconds delay before displaying a new message.
params	See below	Essentially used to customize the image size.
storage	"local"	Specifies the storage location of the conversation state in the browser. "session" defines the state to be stored in the session storage. The session storage persists on reload of the page, and is cleared after the browser or tab is closed, or when sessionStorage.clear()is called. "local" defines the state to be stored in the local stoage. The local storage persists after the the browser is closed, and is cleared when the cookies of the browser are cleared, or when localStorage.clear()is called.
customComponent	null	Custom component to be used with custom responses. E.g.: customComponent={ (messageData) => (<div>Custom React component</div>) }
onWidgetEvent	{}	call custom code on a specific widget event ( onChatOpen, onChatClose, onChatHidden, are available for now ), add a function to the desired object property in the props to have it react to the event.

Additional Examples

customMessageDelay

(message) => {
    let delay = message.length * 30;
    if (delay > 2 * 1000) delay = 3 * 1000;
    if (delay < 400) delay = 1000;
    return delay;
}

onSocketEvent

onSocketEvent={{
  'bot_uttered': () => console.log('the bot said something'),
  'connect': () => console.log('connection established'),
  'disconnect': () => doSomeCleanup(),
}}

params

The params props only allows to specify custom image dimensions:

params={{
        images: {
          dims: {
            width: 300,
            height: 200
          }
        }
      }}

Other features

Tooltip

Text messages received when the widget is closed will be shown as a tooltip.

Sending a message on page load

When reconnecting to an existing chat session, the bot will send a message contained in the localStorage key specified by the NEXT_MESSAGE constant. The message should be stringified JSON with a message property describing the message and an expiry property set to a UNIX timestamp in milliseconds after which this message should not be sent. This is useful if you would like your bot to be able to offer your user to navigate around the site.

API

Method	Description
WebChat.toggle()	Toggle the open/close state of the chat window, send initPayload if webchat is not initialized and is toggled open
WebChat.open()	Open the chat window, send initPayload if webchat is not initialized
WebChat.close()	Close the chat window
WebChat.isOpen()	Get the open/closed state of the widget
WebChat.show()	Show the chat widget, send initPayload if the chat is in open state and not initialized
WebChat.hide()	Hide the chat widget
WebChat.isVisible()	Get the shown/hidden state of the widget
WebChat.send(payload, text: optionnal)	send a payload (/intent{"entity":"value"} to rasa. If text is specified, it will be displayed as a user message. If not specified, no user message will be displayed

Backends

The widget can be used with any backend but is primarily designed to be used with Rasa or Botfront.

Rasa

Use the socketio channel: See instructions in the Rasa documentation

If you want to process customData in Rasa you have to create a new channel. Use channel rasa_core.channels.socketio as a template for your new channel. In such channel customData can be retrieved via data['customData']. Then you can modify sender_id, save customData to the database, fill slots or whatever you need to with your additional data.

Botfront

The Rasa Webchat is developped by the Botfront team and it works with Botfront. Make sure to specificy the language in the customData prop. E.g. customData={{language: 'en'}}. See in Botfront docs for more details.

Others

Your backend must expose a socket with socket.io

Receiving messages from the chat

@socketio.on('user_uttered')
    def handle_message(message):
        # do something

Sending messages from the backend to the chat widget

sending plain text

emit('bot_uttered', {"text": "hello"}, room=session_id)

sending quick replies

message = {
  "text": "Happy?",
  "quick_replies":[
    {"title":"Yes", "payload":"/affirm"},
    {"title":"No", "payload":"/deny"}
  ]}
emit('bot_uttered', message, room=socket_id)

sending a link Snippet

Admittedly a bit far fetched, thinking that Snippets would evolve to carousels of generic templates :)

message = {
  "attachment":{
    "type":"template",
    "payload":{
      "template_type":"generic",
      "elements":[
        {
          "title":"Title",
          "buttons":[ {
            "title":"Link name",
            "url": "http://link.url"
          }
        ]
      }
    ]
  }
}
}
emit('bot_uttered', message, room=socket_id)

sending a Video Message

message = {
  "attachment":{
    "type":"video",
    "payload":{
      "title":"Link name",
      "src": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f3EbDbm8XqY"
    }
  }
}
emit('bot_uttered', message, room=socket_id)

sending an Image Message

message = {
      "attachment":{
        "type":"image",
        "payload":{
          "title":"Link name",
          "src": "https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcT_IX5FSDQLrwm9qvuXu_g7R9t_-3yBSycZ8OxpRXvMDaTAeBEW"
        }
      }
    }
emit('bot_uttered', message, room=socket_id)

sending a message with custom data

message = {
      "data":{
        "customField1": 'anything you want',
        "customField2": 'other custom data, 
      }
    }
emit('bot_uttered', message, room=socket_id)

sending a message to be displayed as a tooltip

You first need to set a tooltipPayload in the props of the component, then, for the answer to that payload, you should define a response with an

object and a property tooltip = true. This message will then be displayed as a tooltip before the widget is opened. This works with Botfront, but not yet with vanilla Rasa.

The prop tooltipDelay lets you set a delay before calling the payload. It default to 500ms.

message = {
  "text": "Hi!",
  "metadata":{
    "tooltip": true
   }
 }
emit('bot_uttered', message, room=socket_id)

Styles

From version 0.8 we started prefixing all css classes, if you already had css styling for the widget, just prepend rw- to all the classes you changed.

hierarchy:

.rw-conversation-container
  |-- .rw-header
        |-- .rw-title
        |-- .rw-close-function
        |-- .rw-loading
  |-- .rw-messages-container
        |-- .rw-message
              |-- .rw-client
              |-- .rw-response
        |-- .rw-replies
              |-- .rw-reply
              |-- .rw-response
        |-- .rw-snippet
              |-- .rw-snippet-title
              |-- .rw-snippet-details
              |-- .rw-link
        |-- .rw-imageFrame
        |-- .rw-videoFrame
  |-- .rw-sender
        |-- .rw-new-message
        |-- .rw-send

Class	Description
.rw-widget-container	The div containing the chatbox of the default version
.rw-widget-embedded	div of the embedded chatbox (using embedded prop)
.rw-full-screen	div of the fullscreen chatbox (using fullScreenMode prop)
.rw-conversation-container	the parent div containing the header, message-container and sender
.rw-messages-container	the central area where the messages appear
.rw-sender	div of the bottom area which prompts user input
.rw-new-message	the text input element of sender
.rw-send	the send icon element of sender
.rw-header	div of the top area with the chatbox header
.rw-title	the title element of the header
.rw-close-button	the close icon of the header
.rw-loading	the loading status element of the header
.rw-message	the boxes holding the messages of client and response
.rw-replies	the area that gives quick reply options
.rw-snippet	a component for describing links
.rw-imageFrame	a container for sending images
.rw-videoFrame	a container for sending video

Contributors

@PHLF @znat @TheoTomalty @Hub4IT @dliuproduction @MatthieuJnon @mofortin