Hi all,

My name is Ray, and while I’m a complete beginner when it comes to chatbots, I think you’ll be seeing a lot of me.

I have been coding since I was 13 years old when I got an Acorn Electron and promptly set about to take over the world! This took the form of a World Cup Football Management simulation game I wrote. Unfortunately I was never able to win the world cup as I could never make it past the quarter finals! My brother on the hand would obliterate every team in his path to win the trophy every time he played! So much for inside knowledge!!

In recent times I have started my own app development business and have produced a couple of apps that can be found on the play store.

I have been interested in AI for a good few years, but have not actually thought of trying to do it myself until now. I visited the Loebner Prize at Bletchley Park this past weekend, and have to admit I was hooked. Now I have begun a deep and all encompassing love affair with all things AI….which has reignited my desire to take over the world!

I like to do things the hard way, so I will be developing my bot from scratch. It will be an interesting journey I’m sure.

I hope to talk with lots of you over the coming months and years as we enjoy the burgeoning world of AI together!

Ray

Welcome Ray.
Even though you are developing your bot from scratch, you also have a choice to develop (or not), your chatbot interpreter from scratch. Pros and cons accompany either approach.

Hi Merlin.

Thanks for the welcome

I’m still undecided on the interpreter at the moment. I would like to build my own, but this would dramatically increase the workload obviously. I have looked at program-o as a possible alternative.

But i do like to make things difficult for myself lol

ChatScript seems popular.
Some also like RiveScript.
AIML/Pandorabots comes with some content that helps bootstrapping.

You might want to look at some of them for ideas before you build your own.

Then again, many of us on this board have built ours from scratch.

Welcome, Ray!

I see I’m in good company, with yet another who doesn’t mind “re-inventing the wheel”!

As the lead developer of Program O, I can assure you that there will be challenges and obstacles aplenty, should you choose to go with it. Of course, “going with it” depends a lot on several factors, such as whether you’re looking to make your bot web-based, your proficiency level with PHP/MySQL, and availability of a remote hosting solution. Should you decide that you want to use Program O, I stand ready to assist you, so just give me a holler.

Good to see you Ray. If we can help in any way, just let us know.

Thanks Merlin. Thats a really good idea to get ideas from those already out there.

Hi Dave. I’m sure I will be picking your brain on a regular basis. I have good proficiency in PHP & MySQL as I have used it for the backend of one of my apps. And I will definitely be asking questions when I started examining program-o in depth.

Hi Steve. I actually spoke to you very briefly on Saturday at Bletchley Park, so you’re partly responsible for helping me decide to start the journey.

Looking around at the posts and articles on the site I can see that I definitely have a lot of ground work to do before I even have a clue of where to start!

No worries, just start here: https://www.chatbots.org/ai_zone/viewthread/492/

Don, it’s great that you’ve linked my article, but I have to point out that it’s just a bit out of date (though still potentially valid, in a broad sense). One of these days, I’d like to rewrite it to add more up-to-date information, but there are several factors that prevent such, ATM. {sigh!} perhaps some day.

Ray Burton - Nov 17, 2014:

Hi Steve. I actually spoke to you very briefly on Saturday at Bletchley Park, so you’re partly responsible for helping me decide to start the journey.

Hey don’t be blaming me for starting something that will soon consume your every free moment
Did we speak right at the end of the day just after the results were announced?

Steve Worswick - Nov 18, 2014:

Hey don’t be blaming me for starting something that will soon consume your every free moment
Did we speak right at the end of the day just after the results were announced?

No it was a very brief chat just after the start of round 2 about whether any questions were off limits, and whether that meant you had to program the bot to lie.

I’m actually getting more excited the more I read…but I can see that it’s going to take all of my spare time now lol

Ah yes, I remember that Ray. Round 2 was where I started to notice that something may be going wrong with the contest and so my attention was elsewhere.

Creating a chatbot is a great pastime and when you get emails from people saying how much they enjoy talking to it, well that makes it even more worthwhile. Good luck on this long journey.