Ruby Telegram bot: Automated message sending based on database field

Other Questions Telegram bot
1

Hey folks! I’m working on a Ruby-based Telegram bot using Rack. I’m stuck on how to make it send a message when a specific field in my database matches the current time. Here’s what I’m trying to do:

class Appointment < ApplicationRecord
  def notify
    if scheduled_for == Time.current
      send_notification('Your appointment is starting now!')
    end
  end
end

I need the bot to constantly check if any appointments are ready for notification. I’ve heard about background job processors but I’m not sure how to implement this. Any ideas on how to set up continuous monitoring and automatic message sending? Thanks in advance for your help!

2

For your Telegram bot scenario, I’d suggest looking into the ‘whenever’ gem. It’s a Ruby gem that provides a clear syntax for writing and deploying cron jobs. You could set up a task that runs every minute to check for appointments:

every 1.minute do
  runner 'Appointment.check_and_notify'
end

Then in your Appointment model:

def self.check_and_notify
  where(scheduled_for: Time.current).find_each(&:notify)
end

This approach is lightweight and doesn’t require additional services like Sidekiq. It’s particularly useful if you’re working with a smaller scale application or have limited resources. Remember to ensure your server’s time is correctly synchronized for accurate scheduling.

3

I’ve tackled a similar challenge with a Ruby Telegram bot before. Instead of constantly checking the database, which can be resource-intensive, I’d recommend using a job scheduler like Sidekiq or Rufus Scheduler.

Here’s a rough outline of how I approached it:

  1. Set up Sidekiq in your Rails app.
  2. Create a job that runs periodically (say, every minute) to check for upcoming appointments.
  3. In the job, query for appointments within the next minute and trigger notifications.

The job might look something like this:

class AppointmentNotifierJob
  include Sidekiq::Worker

  def perform
    upcoming = Appointment.where(scheduled_for: Time.current..1.minute.from_now)
    upcoming.each(&:notify)
  end
end

Then schedule this job to run every minute using Sidekiq-cron or a similar tool. This approach is more efficient and scalable than constant database polling. Hope this helps!

4

hey there! i’ve used sidekiq for similar stuff before. it’s pretty neat. you could set up a job that runs every minute to check for appointments:

class CheckAppointmentsJob
  include Sidekiq::Worker
  def perform
    Appointment.where(scheduled_for: Time.now).each(&:notify)
  end
end

then just schedule it with sidekiq-cron. works like a charm!