About This File
Introduction
Sopel is a simple, lightweight, open source, easy-to-use IRC Utility bot, written in Python. It's designed to be easy to use, run and extend.
Installation
Latest stable release
On most systems where you can run Python, the best way to install Sopel is to install pip and then pip install sopel.
Arch users can install the sopel package from the [community] repository, though new versions might take slightly longer to become available.
Failing both of those options, you can grab the latest tarball from GitHub and follow the steps for installing from the latest source below.
Latest source
First, either clone the repository with git clone git://github.com/sopel-irc/sopel.git or download a tarball from GitHub.
Note: Sopel requires Python 3.7+ to run.
In the source directory (whether cloned or from the tarball) run pip install -e .. You can then run sopel to configure and start the bot.
Database support
Sopel leverages SQLAlchemy to support the following database types: SQLite, MySQL, PostgreSQL, MSSQL, Oracle, Firebird, and Sybase. By default Sopel will use a SQLite database in the current configuration directory, but alternative databases can be configured with the following config options: db_type, db_filename (SQLite only), db_driver, db_user, db_pass, db_host, db_port, and db_name. You will need to manually install any packages (system or pip) needed to make your chosen database work.
Note: Plugins not updated since Sopel 7.0 was released might have problems with database types other than SQLite (but many will work just fine).
Adding plugins
The easiest place to put new plugins is in ~/.sopel/plugins. Some newer plugins are installable as packages; search PyPI for these. Many more plugins written by other users can be found using your favorite search engine.
Some older, unmaintained plugins are available in the sopel-extras repository, but of course you can also write your own. A tutorial for creating new plugins is available on Sopel's website. API documentation can be found online at https://sopel.chat/docs/, or you can create a local version by running make docs.
Further documentation
The official website includes such valuable information as a full listing of built-in commands, tutorials, API documentation, and other usage information.
Questions?
Join us in #sopel on Libera Chat.
Donations
We're thrilled that you want to support the project!
You can sponsor Sopel here on GitHub or donate through Open Collective.
Any donations received will be used to cover infrastructure costs, such as our domain name and hosting services. Our main project site is easily hosted by Netlify, but we are considering building a few new features that would require more than static hosting. All project-related expenses are tracked on our Open Collective profile, for transparency.
