There are multiple steps to follow for setting up a successful webhook.
Set up a simple web server
For this example, we'll set up and use our own web server to POST to. Our server will have a single endpoint, that simply returns a message to our bot.
Python
The example server below is running Python through Flask. Upon receiving the webhook payload, the server will respond by returning a simple message.
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from flask import Flask, jsonify
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app = Flask(__name__)
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​
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@app.route('/kindly', methods=['POST'])
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defget():
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response ={
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'reply':'Hello from server!',
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}
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​
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return jsonify(response)
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When running the script above, the server will run on localhost, with port 9000
Node
The example server below is running on Hapi. Upon receiving the webhook payload, the server will respond by returning a simple message.
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const Hapi =require("hapi");
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const server = Hapi.server({
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host:"0.0.0.0",
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port:9000
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});
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​
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server.route({
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method:"POST",
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path:"/kindly",
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handler:()=>({
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reply:"Hello from server!"
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})
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});
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​
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server.start();
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When running the script above, the server will run on localhost, with port 9000
Set up ngrok
To test our newly configured server, we'll need to serve the script through ngrok. Ngrok is necessary for Kindly to communicate with our development machine (localhost), using it makes it a lot faster to develop, test and prototype new integrations and webhooks.
Follow the link above to set up ngrok on your machine.
When ngrok is set up, we need to point it to the port on which our server is running. This can be acheived with the following command ./ngrok http 9000. Note that this needs to be done inside the folder you installed ngrok.
If the command is successful, something similar to the following will be visible in our terminal.
When our server is set up, and ngrok is running, we need to create a new dialogue and paste in the address we want to POST to.
In the Build section, navigate to a dialogue, then Output, and under Advanced features paste in the address ngrok provided. In my case, I would paste in http://725a9731.ngrok.io.
Webhook URL
Be sure to include the endpoint path in the URL which we used in our server - /kindly - to get the correct response.
Trigger webhook
Now we're ready to test our webhook through the chat bubble, by triggering the dialogue we created earlier. If everything is set up correctly, the bot will respond with our message.
Webhook test
Inspect response
When the dialogue is triggered, and the response is received, we can inspect the response in the debug console. The object created in the console will give us a detailed overview of the payload sent, and received.
Webhook console
Examples
Check out this example for a complete webhook app.