Google Wave: Up and Running

Quick! Let’s Code a Robot!

In this brief exercise we’ll be developing a simple Python-based robot that responds to blips added by participants. Our Oracle Bot, which we’ll deploy to App Engine, will listen for blips that end with a question mark. Any time a participant submits a blip that ends in a question mark, the Oracle Bot will respond with one of several answers chosen at random. Our goal is to create a playful robot that allows people to ask “the Oracle” all kinds of questions.

List of Ingredients

• Source code text editor or IDE configured for Python and HTML

• Image-editing app or clip art

• App Engine account (you can sign up for one at http://appengine.google.com)

• Google App Engine Launcher

You can view the code for this example in its entirety without any breaks in Appendix A. The code is also available on Google Project Hosting: http://code.google.com/p/oracle-bot.

Set Up the App Engine Application

Once you’ve set up an App Engine account, you’ll want to create a new application that will host the robot. For this sample robot, I will use oracle-bot as an application name. That means that my robot will be hosted at http://oracle-bot.appspot.com and that [e-mail] will be its contact address in the Google Wave Client. Because App Engine application names are unique, you should set up your own application to use a different name.

Warning

App Engine currently restricts users to 10 registered applications, including Google Wave robots. Be careful and choose wisely when adding ...