XKCD Telegram Bot

This bot serves XKCD comics to a Telegram channel in a random sequence. It is designed to provide an alternative way to explore XKCD comics outside the sequential order presented on the official XKCD website.

Overview

XKCD is a popular webcomic that covers topics like science, technology, programming, and internet culture with a distinctive stick figure drawing style. This bot fetches unread comics randomly from XKCD and posts them to a specified Telegram channel.

Features

• Random Comic Selection: Comics are selected randomly, providing a varied reading experience.
• Image and Caption Posting: Both the comic image and its caption are posted. Captions play an important role in xkcd!
• Batch Posting Capability: Allows for multiple comics to be posted in a batch.
• Configurable Post Interval: Users can set a custom interval range for comic posting. The bot will sleep a random time within the range.

Setup Instructions

Requirements

• Docker
• A Telegram bot API token (get it from @BotFather)
• A Telegram user/channel for posting (get it from @userinfobot)

Deployment

1. Clone this repository.
2. Create a .env file containing your Telegram bot API token and the Telegram channel ID. Refer to .env.sample to see available environment variables.
3. Use Docker Compose to deploy the bot:

docker compose up --build -d

Contribution

Contributions to the bot's development are welcome. To contribute, please fork the repository, make your changes, and submit a pull request. You can also open issues for bugs or feature requests.

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see LICENSE for details.

Acknowledgments

• XKCD for the webcomic content.
• The Telegram Bot API.