I’m working on a Discord bot and need help with command handling. I want my bot to respond differently based on whether the user provides complete or incomplete command arguments.
For example, when someone types !version 1.2, the bot should show the changelog for version 1.2. But if they just type !version without any number, I want the bot to display a list of available versions they can choose from.
Right now my bot only works when the command is called with all required parameters. How can I make it detect when arguments are missing and send a helpful fallback message instead of doing nothing?
use optional parameters in your command setup. most discord libraries let you define required vs optional args - when someone types !version without a number, it auto-triggers your fallback function. way cleaner than manually checking arrays every time
Integrate argument validation within your command handler by splitting the message content after detecting the command prefix, and evaluate the array’s length. If it falls short of the required number of arguments, invoke a fallback response. Specifically for the version command, ensure to check if args.length is greater than one. If only the base command is provided, execute a function that lists available versions rather than attempting a changelog lookup. This method is universally applicable across various commands and improves the user experience by preventing the bot from appearing unresponsive.
I ran into the same issue with my Discord bot. Here’s what worked for me - check your arguments array right after parsing the command. I added a simple condition to verify the arguments exist and are valid before running any logic. For your version command, just check if args[0] exists and matches a valid version. If not, return a list of available versions instead of leaving users hanging. This approach has worked really well - users get helpful feedback even when they forget to include the data.