Hello Everybody!

I am very new to the world of Chatbots and currently working on my first one (a simple Study-Bot with some topic based Question-Answer and Multiple Choice Tests on Pandorabots).

I would like to know from more seasoned users what your process is before you start coding. How much you plan and how. Do you use flow charts to plan out everything in advance etc.

Generally speaking, I code more for conversation than a Q&A style, so the process may be different, but what I do is this:

1.) I first outline what sort of topic I’ll be coding for, generating a list of sub-topics that may or may not be included.
2.) I then gather at least one friend (3 or more is best, I’ve found) who have an interest in the topic/sub-topics I’ve compiled, and we all have a discussion about it/them, while I take notes (usually I just record the discussion for my notes).
3.) From those notes, I separate out each question or statement, and compile as large a list of alternate ways to say/ask it as I can.
4.) From there, I start “culling” the lists to see if they can be reduced, and if so, how.
5.) I then start crafting responses, taking into account the personality of the chatbot I’m doing all of this for. During this process I’m still culling, and determining whether I can <srai> any of the responses.
6.) Once I’ve done all of this, I then fire up my [shameless-plug] AIML Toolkit [/shameless-plug] to begin the creation of the AIML file itself.

If that seems like it’s a huge amount of work to do to create an AIML file, it is, but for me it’s the best way to create some quality responses for my chatbot.