I want to develop a chatbot that will specifically reply only on certain products with their description. Products are classified into some categories. Fro example, category_1 has product_1 ,...,product_15 and category_2 has product_16 ,...,product_35 and so on.

Now I just want the chatbot to correctly deliver the product description when user say the product name. If it has been asked what are all the products in a certain category, those products should be listed.

Upto my knowledge, either I can script the products in .top files [separated by categories as topics files] or I can store the details in table format using postgresql.

Problem with .top files is, whe user shits from one category[topic files] to another category of products , chatbot is not recognising this change in topic. how to effectively do that. That is, if the enquired product is not in the current category,it must automatically shift to another topic and start looking for the product there.

Then regarging postgresql, I couldn’t find the complete procedure of running chatscript with postgresql.

Actually I am a little bit confused which is the best way to choose.

Your reply will be most favourable.Thanks in advance

How do you know when the user shifts from one category to another.  What do they say?
Offhand I would build a table of products in a category, creating a fact like
(“health bar” member ~category1)
which is analogous to saying:
concept: ~category1 (“health bar” Cheerios ...)
and also do
(“health bar” description “a tasty health bar”)

That way, when a user mentions a product name,  you can query for the description.  I don’t see a need for separate topic files per category yet, since you merely want to take a product name. As for getting all the products in a category, the member query on the category will get you that

I wouldn’t bother doing anything with postgres until you have built your demo completely and know what you want to do

Bruce Wilcox - Mar 19, 2016:

How do you know when the user shifts from one category to another.  What do they say?
Offhand I would build a table of products in a category, creating a fact like
(“health bar” member ~category1)
which is analogous to saying:
concept: ~category1 (“health bar” Cheerios ...)
and also do
(“health bar” description “a tasty health bar”)

That way, when a user mentions a product name,  you can query for the description.  I don’t see a need for separate topic files per category yet, since you merely want to take a product name. As for getting all the products in a category, the member query on the category will get you that

User simply asks about a different product from a different category, which I could not keep track of. It would be helpful if there is any way to know that.

I will try arranging products do as you said.

I find your reply much useful Mr.Bruce.

Bruce Wilcox - Mar 19, 2016:

I wouldn’t bother doing anything with postgres until you have built your demo completely and know what you want to do

yes I have a demo of my chatbot and a database in postgres but don’t know how to connect both. First of all, I couldn’t run the sample postgres demo in Chatscript package. Any hint to make it work will be helpful