Quick Start

Open the editor

On the home page click "Open the editor". The editor runs entirely in your browser: block palette on the left, canvas in the middle, toolbar at the top. Your project is saved automatically and the config file can be downloaded at any moment.

Drop a Command block

Drag a "Command" block from the palette onto the canvas. A command reacts to the user's words: they type "hello" — the bot replies with the configured text. The demo blocks already on the canvas can be deleted (select a block and press Delete) — or build your own scenario next to them.

Set up triggers and the reply

Click the block — the properties panel opens. Fill in the trigger words ("hello", "hi") and the reply text ("Hi! I'm a bookstore bot. What's your name?"). Every field has a help tooltip explaining what it means.

Save the user's answer to a variable

Add a "Step" block and connect the first block to it. The question "What's your name?" is already asked in the first block's response, so in the step just set "Save to: userName" — the user's answer will be stored in the variable. The step's own text is optional and is sent after the reply. Reference the variable in any later text as {{userName}}, and a "Condition" block can check its value and branch the dialog either way.

Test the scenario in the preview

Click "Chat Preview" in the top toolbar and type "hello". The preview plays the scenario exactly as the platform will: shows the welcome message, reacts to trigger words, stores variables. Errors are highlighted right on the blocks — you'll spot a problem before the bot goes live.

Export the configuration

Click "Validate & Export". The editor checks the scenario (empty replies, orphan blocks, duplicate names) and lets you download flow.json — your whole bot in one file. You can edit it by hand and load it back into the editor.

Install Node.js

To run the bot you need Node.js 22 or newer — download it from nodejs.org. If Node.js is already installed, check the version with node -v.

Generate the project

Open a terminal in the folder with flow.json and run:

npx umbot create from-flow flow.json --output ./my-bot

The command creates a ready TypeScript project: the bot source code (src/index.ts, src/utils.ts), package.json and tsconfig.json.

Launch the bot

Install the dependencies, build the project and start the bot:

cd my-bot
npm install
npm run build
npm start

The bot starts on localhost:3000. Platforms (Telegram, Alisa, VK, Marusia and others) are plugged in as adapters in src/index.ts — you supply the tokens on your side.