Kickstart To Microsoft Bot And Build Your First Bot Application On Local Host

Introduction

This article will help you understand what Microsoft Bot is, where we use it, and how to build the first application in Microsoft Bot.

Microsoft Bot

Microsoft Bot helps us build and deploy the bots which we can use and enjoy  for conversations and face a good experience. The Bot Framework allows us to build, connect, manage, and publish bots that interact wherever users are talking  – from text/sms to Skype, Facebook Messenger, Office 365 mail, and other services.

Requirements

• Visual Studio 2015 updated
• Microsoft Bot Emulator (Download Microsoft Bot Emulator from here)
• Bot Framework application template (Download Bot Framework application template from this link)

Note:

Make sure that you have added Bot Framework Application Template at this directory address - “%USERPROFILE%\Documents\Visual Studio 2015\Templates\ProjectTemplates\Visual C#".

Follow the below steps, now, to create a simple Bot Application using your Visual Studio, and run it on a Bot Emulator.

Step 1 - Run Visual Studio 2015. Click on New Project >> Visual C# >> Bot Application >> Name your Bot Application, and select the location below. Click on OK.



Step 2 - This Bot Application in Visual Studio helps us with the already written code in all our modules of Solution Explorer. In Solution Explorer, you can find Web.config file. Just click on it. You can name your BotID, Microsoft App ID, and Microsoft App Password over here.



When we run this app, we get the text which we have mentioned in the code at default.htm, as mentioned below.



Step 3 - Now, you can run this app by clicking on the “Google Chrome” button in the top ribbon. You can configure any web browser with your Visual Studio account. Just click on it.



Now, you can see that the Bot Framework gets built on your local machine with the help of your web browser.



Take a good look on the URL which has “localhost:3979”. We will be using it in our future articles to run it on the Emulator.

Step 4 - Download the Microsoft Bot Framework Emulator from the above mentioned link and install it on your machine now. You will be getting the below screen. Click on "Install".





After completing  the installation, click on “Run”.



Here is the Framework Emulator which we will be using for running the Bot Application.



Note: Follow my future articles to learn how to build a word counting Bot Application on a chat panel, running a bot framework on Emulator, and hosting it on Azure, etc.,