cashbot

A Telegram bot to register your expenses/incomes.

Usage

$ cashbot.py config.yaml

The YAML configuration file is in the form:

telegram_token: <telegram_token>
allowed_users:
    - <user_id_1>
    - <user_id_2>
categories:
    - Life
    - House
    - Baby
    - Beer
outputs:
    - type: ifttt
      api_key: <ifttt_api_key>
      expense_event: out
      income_event: in
    - type: csv
      file: /path/to/csv
    - type: excel
      file: /path/to/excel

Usage

Chat with the bot. Basic usage:

> /out 20 life Dinner with colleagues
< Done
> /in 500 life Salary
< Done

You can use just the first letters of a category

> /out 8.5 b Out with friends
< Too many matches: Baby,Beer
> /out 8.5 be Out with friends
< Done

You can list the categories:

> /cat
< Life
  House
  Baby
  Beer

How to activate a bot

• Start a chat with the BotFather
• Send the /newbot command
• Give a name to your robot: for instance "My Accounting Bot"
• Choose a username for your robot, like MyAccountingBot (it must end in "bot")
• Copy the API token in the YAML file

How to discover your user id

• Start a chat with the bot you've just created (you can just click on the link the BotFather prints after you've created the bot)
• After you've sent the /start command, send a Hi message
• Launch the script get_updates.py <telegram_token>. Or...
• ...you can do the request yourself: curl -X GET https://api.telegram.org/bot<token_id>/GetUpdates. The response should be:

{
    "ok": true,
    "result": [
        {
            "message": {
                "chat": {
                    "first_name": "Your first name",
                    "id": <user_id>,
                    "last_name": "Your last name",
                    "type": "private"
                },
                "date": <current_date>,
                "from": {
                    "first_name": "Your first name",
                    "id": <user_id>,
                    "last_name": "Your last name"
                },
                "message_id": 2,
                "text": "Hi"
            },
            "update_id": <update_id>
        }
    ]
}

How to use the IFTTT output

• Find out your API key
  • Go to (https://ifttt.com/maker)
  • Click on the Settings button
  • You'll see a link in the form https://maker.ifttt.com/use/<api_key>
  • Copy the api key in the yaml configuration file
• Create a new applet to register incomes
  • Select Maker trigger and an event name (for instance: "incomes")
  • Select Google Drive action, Add row to a spreasheet.
  • Formatted row: =DATEVALUE(SUBSTITUTE("{{OccurredAt}}"," at ", " ")) ||| {{Value1}} ||| ||| {{Value2}} ||| {{Value3}}
• Create a new applet to register expenses
  • Select Maker trigger and an event name (for instance: "expenses")
  • Select Google Drive action, Add row to a spreasheet. Select the same spreadsheet.
  • Formatted row: =DATEVALUE(SUBSTITUTE("{{OccurredAt}}"," at ", " ")) ||| ||| {{Value1}} ||| {{Value2}} ||| {{Value3}}

Dockerfile

A Dockerfile for ARM architecture is included. To build the image cd to the project directory and run:

$ docker build -t cashbot -f Dockerfile.rpi .

To run the container:

$ docker run -d -v /path/to/config.yml:/config/config.yml --restart=always cashbot

TODO

• Excel output