Bot Framework SDK documentation says that Web App Bot is deprecated. But there is no information about the difference between development with Azure Bot and (deprecated) Web App Bot. What exact changes should be done if we migrate form one service (Web App Bot) to another (Azure Bot)?
In regards of other contributor's answer, I think main concept and
queries has not explained accordingly, so I felt it requires more
explanation in addition to clear the OP's main concern.
Questions: But there is no information about the difference between development with Azure Bot and (deprecated) Web App Bot.
The Bot Service behind Azure Bot and Web App Bot/Bot Channels Registration is the same; the change is in how the resources are
created that you use in your bot such as web apps, language
understanding, and more.
Rather than the one size fits all templates that the Web App Bot used,
Bot Framework Composer can be used to create resources for the Bot
with much more flexibility than the Web App Bot templates allowed.
Bot Channels Registration and Azure Bot are basically the same
capabilities renamed. The UX is slightly different in the Azure Portal
to help customers connect to the Bot Framework Composer.
Its clearly documented here in the official document you can get here
Questions: What exact changes should be done if we migrate form one service (Web App Bot) to another (Azure Bot)?
Currently migration from Web App BottoAzure Bot isn't supported.
If your Web App Bot isn't being used in production, you can delete
your old Web App Bot resource and reuse the bot name and app ID in a
new bot resource (after some time for the old record to get deleted).
The new Azure Bot is designed around creating your bot using
Composer, Bot Framework SDK, and so the gains from such a migration
would be minimal. You can get the official explanation here
Note:
Now you might be wondering, what about your existing Web app bot. Your bot and other resources will continue to work without any problem and you don't need to migrate your old web app bot in this aspect.
One question may arise,then why its been depricated or no longer be used?
The answer would be, Functionally though Azure Bot, Web App Bot, and
Bot Channels Registration all utilize the Bot Service in the same way
"under the hood". The Azure Bot path is easier, and more
configurable for developers in comparison of Web app bot
Hope above explanation will redeem your concern.
The Azure Bot is like the Bot Channel Registration. It is a global resource that identifies your bot to toher Azure resources and contains configurations and settings for the bot's external messaging endpoint, channels (Teams, Web Chat, Email, etc.), Exposing APIs, OAuth settings, and more.
To actually host the bot, you would use an Azure App Service. You would create one during the deployment process.
As the stated in the linked docs, existing resources will continue to work. Note that the docs specify that migration is not supported. Moving forward, when you build a new bot, you should use a combination of an Azure Bot for identity and configuration and an App Service to host and run the bot.
Related
Currently there are two portal options to update the endpoint for a Teams Bot:
https://dev.teams.microsoft.com/bots (works intermittently)
https://dev.botframework.com/bots
How can we update this from the command line / with code?
I'm aware of the az bot commands (https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/cli/azure/bot?view=azure-cli-latest) but this appears to be for managing resources deployed under 'Bot Services', and not bots created via the 'Bot Framework'.
Thanks.
I had a chat just last week with someone else about this - see How to add authentication to a Bot Framework v4 project without Azure Bot Service?
In essence, the "bot portal" is basically just provisioning things for you behind the scenes in the Azure portal in any case - I'd suggest rather just doing everything in Azure directly. In any, the Microsoft Bot "Framework" conceptually consists of two pieces - code samples + SDKs, and a backend core service that underlies every bot. As a result, bot "Framework" bots also have a "Bot Service" backend. Note that, by itself, this does not include hosting for the bot, just a central service registration to handle the traffic routing, security, etc.
Please have a read of the blog post I refer in that other question - it (hopefully) gives a good overview.
In answer to your question directly - az bot should be fine to use, specifically https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/cli/azure/bot?view=azure-cli-latest#az-bot-update
I am building a Teams App which uses a search based messaging extension. As far as I understand, I need a bot for this, because the bot is basically posting the adaptive card created from the data on my external webapp to the chat.
Is it possible to create or host a bot somewhere else than in Azure? I do not have an Azure subscription. If so, how would I go about using a different Bot for my Teams App?
Thanks for helping in advance!
Teams bots rely on the underlying Microsoft Bot Framework - the same engine for building any kinds of bots in the Microsoft ecosystem (e.g. slack or web or facebook bots). The only way to register those bots in MS Bot Framework is, yes, via the Azure portal. However, you don't need to HOST your bot in Azure - the physical web endpoint can live anywhere that's publicly httpS addressable (e.g. AWS), as long as the registration for the bot is in Azure.
yes, you can create the Bot framework locally and run it using Visual Studio.
To debug Bot locally in teams you need to use a tunneling service like ngrok.
To install ngrok run the following command.
ngrok http <port> -host-header=localhost:<port>
Here is document related Bot framework running locally and the installation steps for ngrok.
I would like to understand how payments work as far as Microsoft Bot Framework is concerned.
This is my scenario: In Visual Studio Code I wrote an bot app using Microsoft Teams Toolkit to use it as a chatbot in Microsoft Teams. My company has an Azure Active Directory subscription, so my bot app appeared there. This app communicates with an endpoint which is NOT hosted on Azure.
So my question is - will it generate any extra costs? Should I worry about this 10000 messages per month limit?
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/pricing/details/bot-services/
As I understand I'm not using Azure Bot Services as I host my endpoint and I'm taking care of the logic, am I right?
My endpoint is written in .Net Core using Bot Framework SDK. So I use their classes and also MicrosoftAppId and MicrosoftAppPassword is also sent to the endpoint (obligatory to use with Teams).
Thanks for clearing it for me.
You can see in the link that the limit only applies to premium channels. Your Teams bot should be fine.
I'm wondering how I would connect a microsoft bot written in c# with a signalr chat.
To be specific: I have a signalr chat in which users can talk to "coaches". But the bot has to listen to these chats in case the user asks the bot something (or other reasons the bot needs to do something). How would I do this?
Check out these resources that should give you enough combined information for you to build a connector for your bot to interact with SignalR.
This tutorial details how to build an ASP.NET Core app that integrates SignalR. Utilizes the SignalR client library.
This doc discusses how to build an Azure Function that "can leverage the Azure SignalR Service bindings to add real-time capabilities." I don't know if you are using the Azure flavor of SignalR and you don't mention Azure Functions, but this could give insight in how to design and implement.
You may need to use the BotFramework REST APIs (docs here) to forward and receive activities to your bot (depending on how you structure it all). If you build the connector as part of the same project as your bot, then this is less likely.
You will need to understand the activity schema so you an correctly interpolate the data being passed to and from your bot.
Lastly, here are some connectors from the Botbuilder-Community repo that you can use as a reference (Alexa, Google, Twitter) for development.
As you are probably aware, you need to build a service that allows your bot to connect to SignalR. This means authenticating against your SignalR service to retrieve a token or similar. Once that is complete, then it's a matter of the data being passed around. If you can successfully pass data, then it's configuring your bot to reply and send activities that SignalR can accept (for instance, a hero card may render while an adaptive card may not).
Hope of help!
I deployed my QnAmaker chatbot using the new GA QnAmaker portal today. But after creating the knowledge base, i can't find the channels tab in Azure anymore.
In the channels tab, you could deploy the chatbot to different channels like Microsoft Teams or the Webchat.
Has anyone found this tab in Azure?
You just created your QnAMaker knowledge base and all the necessary items to use it (web app to host the service, Azure Search for the search part).
Now the next step is to create a bot by doing the following:
On Azure, create a Web App Bot
Use Question And Answer bot template in order to have the basic code to call QnAMaker already implemented
Once it is created, you will have at least the following resources: one Web App bot (to manage channels) and one App Service (hosting your bot code)
Go to the Web App Bot item
Select Application Settings menu, you will found several settings: QnAKnowledgebaseId, QnAAuthKey and QnAEndpointHostName
Fill those values with your QnA settings:
QnAKnowledgebaseId: it's your knowledge base Id on QnaMaker.ai website
QnAAuthKey: it's the Authorization EndpointKey value on QnaMaker.ai website (check https://www.qnamaker.ai/UserSettings)
QnAEndpointHostName: the endpoint location where you published your KB (also visible on https://www.qnamaker.ai/UserSettings)
Save
Then it's working ;-) and you can set the channels you want on the Channels menu of this Web App Bot item
Yes! It's still there. QnA MAker going GA has no impact on its functionalities but the way of implementation to some extent, which is of course in a good sense.
You Can find it on Azure Portal => Web App Bot => Bot Management section
Happy Coding!