Limit the access of telegram bot through Chat ID - python-3.x

Question

I have attached the code. I want chat_id to be accessed from the text file located at my local machine.
#constants.py
chatid_list = []
file1 = open(r'D:\\folder1\\chatids.txt', "r")
for chat_id in file1:
chatid_list.append(chat_id)
#main.py
def start(update, context):
chat_id = update.message.chat_id
first_name =update.message.chat.first_name
last_name = update.message.chat.last_name
username = update.message.chat.username
if chat_id in cp.chatid_list:
print("chat_id : {} and firstname : {} lastname : {} username {}". format(chat_id, first_name, last_name , username))
context.bot.send_message(chat_id, 'Hi ' + first_name + ' Whats up?')
update.message.reply_text( text=main_menu_message(),reply_markup=main_menu_keyboard())
else:
print("WARNING: Unauthorized access denied for {}.".format(chat_id))
update.message.reply_text('User disallowed.')

Answer 1

My guess would be that the elements of chatid_list are strings because you read them from a text file, but chat_id is an integer. So you'd either have to convert chat_id to a string or the elements of chatid_list to integers.

Answer 2

As a cleaner alternative, you could consider using environment variables (e.g. with dotenv) to add configuration elements like the chat IDs (as strings, as noted by #CallMeStag).
That would remove the necessity of having to format and read a file for that purpose. In this case, you can have a .env file in the same directory with:
#.env file
# allowed ids - users allowed to use bot
ALLOWED_IDS = 12345678, 24567896
I'm assuming you're using python 3 and can use f-strings.
So, you can throw your constants.py away and your main.py would look like below:
#main.py file
import os
from dotenv import load_dotenv
load_dotenv()
def start(update, context):
chat_id = update.message.chat_id
first_name = update.message.chat.first_name
last_name = update.message.chat.last_name
username = update.message.chat.username
if chat_id in os.getenv('ALLOWED_IDS'):
print(f'chat_id : {chat_id } and firstname : {first_name } lastname : {last_name } username {username }')
context.bot.send_message(chat_id, f'Hi {first_name}, Whats up?')
update.message.reply_text(text=main_menu_message(),reply_markup=main_menu_keyboard())
else:
print(f'WARNING: Unauthorized access denied for {chat_id}.')
update.message.reply_text('User disallowed.')
Finally, in case you want multiple functions to be "protected", you can use a wrapper as shown here.
Edit: added alternative local file types after OP's comment.
You could also store your allowed users in a JSON (ids.json):
{
"allowed_users": [
{
"name": "john wick",
"id": 1234567
},
{
"name": "rick wick",
"id": 2345738
}
]
}
And then read the allowed IDs as follows:
import json
with open(r'./ids.json', 'r') as in_file:
allowed_users = json.load(in_file)['allowed_users']
allowed_ids = [user['id'] for user in allowed_users]
OR, you could simply drop all the IDs into a text file (ids.txt), with one ID per line:
1234567
2345738
And then read them as follows:
allowed_ids = []
with open(r'./ids.txt', 'r') as in_file:
for row in in_file:
allowed_ids.append(int(row.strip()))
Finally, replace os.getenv('ALLOWED_IDS') from the above code snippet with allowed_ids.