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Comment by StavrosK | Hacker News Reader

To avoid exactly this, I'm working on Instabot: http://instabot.stochastictechnologies.com/

It's a hosted bot, similar to hubot, and you'll be able to just go to the site, specify your channel and have Instabot join, without the hassle of setting it up or maintaining it. Of course, it will support all the useful commands, like convenience functions or webhooks.

For early access to the alpha, email me at stavros@stochastictechnologies.com.

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How does one go about writing their own commands for a hosted product?

The commands will trigger a webhook call to your server, where the actual deployment/testing/whatever command you need takes place.

I'm trying to understand which part of my book you're trying to 'avoid'. Because from what I understand it's just the deploying bit? Which my hubot-factory already did, and it is being improved for a new version with the help of a great company. You've also essentially made script writing even harder than it is for hubot.

I'm trying to avoid people needing to even read the book. It's the difference between rolling your own WebSockets or using Pusher, for example. Some people want things to just work.

So you came here to advertise your own product in a post about mine?

You're basically deploying a thing that'll send http requests to another server which then executes specific tasks. So you've essentially replaced hubot with a web application on the end users servers.

What is the difference?

The difference is that you don't have to install or maintain it. Standard SaaS.

"The commands will trigger a webhook call to your server, where the actual deployment/testing/whatever command you need takes place."

The end user still needs to run something on their servers to actually do anything for their custom commands, which is essentially what hubot scripts do, which is what my book is teaching people about.

I know, I'm not disputing anything or devaluing your book. As I said above, some people want things to just work, so we're looking to provide a service for that market. I don't know why you're getting so offended and defensive :/

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