Denis Cercasin

Sources for the Telegram Bot API

This document lists the official references, tutorials, and code snippets that informed our implementation of Telegram bots in Rent Tracker.

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Official Documentation

• Telegram Bot API Overview
  Used as the main reference for understanding bot setup, commands, messages, and authentication.

• Authorizing Your Bot
  Used to create and obtain the bot token via @BotFather.

• python-telegram-bot Docs
  The official library documentation used for bot setup, polling, sending messages, and error handling.

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Code Snippets Referenced/Adapted

1. Registering /start command

@bot.message_handler(commands=['start'])
def start(message):
    bot.send_message(message.chat.id, "Welcome! Please link your account.")

Taken from Telegram Bot API examples, adapted to trigger our user-token binding logic.

2. Sending messages to a specific chat ID

bot.send_message(chat_id=123456789, text="Your rent is due for June.")

Used in our daily reminder script. Syntax verified via official docs.

3. Using polling mode

import telebot
bot = telebot.TeleBot("BOT_TOKEN")
bot.polling()

Used during development phase for local testing.

4. Preparing for webhooks (production)

We plan to switch from polling to webhooks for production deployment. Reference used: Webhook Setup Guide

Additional Community Threads

• GitHub Issues – Handling expired tokens in bots

Provided insight into handling errors in long-lived sessions.

Summary

We use two bots:

1. Registration Bot - for binding Telegram accounts using /start
2. Reminder Bot - sends monthly rent reminders based on unpaid records

Both rely on the python-telegram-bot library and were implemented using official API guidelines and adapted code snippets.

Last build: 20 Jul 2025, 00:44+00:00