Tutorials and Articles

Lovingly authored by Slack

The whole Slack team is pitching in and writing guides to working with the Slack platform and its emergent ecosystem. Contact us if you'd like us to feature your tutorial here.

• Hello World, Bolt ⚡️ - Building your very first app with Bolt

  Building your very first app with Bolt, the official Node.js framework for Slack app development.

• Building contextual search experiences using Block Kit and Node.js

  Learn how to rapidly make visually rich experiences on Slack using Node.js and Block Kit.

• Building a simple bot using Python in 10 minutes 

  A walkthrough guide of building an onboarding bot with Python SDK

• Building a sentiment analysis bot with IBM Watson and Raspberry Pi

  A fun project to analyze emotions of each message!

• Testing shared channels compatibility with Steno

  Prepare your apps for shared channels through mocking and more

• Which API is right for your Slack app? 

  A cheat sheet for getting started with Slack's APIs

• Using ngrok to develop locally for Slack

  How to solve the chicken and egg problem of setting up a functional development environment

• Message Buttons with Node.js

  Build a basic Node.js app with interactive buttons

• Building an onboarding bot in Ruby using Slack's Events API 

  Learn how to build a simple but effective Ruby onboarding bot user, navigate OAuth, & subscribe to the Events API

• Creating an AWS Lambda Function and API Endpoint

  Let go and let Lambda

• Understanding Slack OAuth using Node.js

  An intro to creating a Slack app and installing it on your team... Node.js style

• Working with interactive message menus in Python 

  It doesn't take much code to handle message menus in Python and Flask

• Handling events from the Events API using AWS Lambda

  Amazon's Lambda is a perfectly polite event handler

• Submitting apps to the Slack App Directory

  A voyage through the app submission process told from the developer's perspective

• Sending your first Slack message using Webhook

  Say hello to the Slack app world in minutes. No baggage, no OAuth.

• Create a Slack app and authenticate with Postman

  Testing your app is almost effortless using this handy HTTP request tool

• Storing, retrieving, and modifying file uploads

  Use the Files API to build amazing integrations that allow you to quickly and easily interact with uploaded files.

• A style guide for slash commands

  Slash commands make your users feel powerful. With a wave of their hand, they can summon an action and do the special things your app does. Learn how to wield this magic.

• Your first slash command and custom integration

  If you want to start somewhere, may as well start here

• Easy-peasy bots with Botkit

  Have a great idea for a Slack bot, want to share it with the world, but don't know where to start?

• Easy-peasy slash commands with Botkit

  Learn how to rapidly build and respond to slash commands

Case Studies

Interviews and profiles of the developers behind successful Slack apps.

• Optimizely 

• Doodle Bot 

• Guru 

• Woobot 

• Behind the scenes of /todo 

  We interview the developer behind the successful /todo Slack app.

• The most popular penguin in town: meet Kip! 

  Thousands of users start thousands of conversations with Kip each month.

• Bots you can count on: meet the developers behind Statsbot 

  A discussion with the developers behind the popular analytics vehicle, Statsbot.

• Meet the mind behind Chatlio 

  The obvious choice at the time was, and still is, Slack. That has completely been validated by Slack's growth over the past two years.

Guides and articles from across the web

We're thankful that so many people in our developer community are taking the time to write guides, tutorials, and heady think pieces about working with the Slack platform.

Please get in touch with us if you've written or discovered an article our community will enjoy.

• Build an infinitely scalable* Slack app in 5 minutes 

  Learn how to quickly deploy a Slack app in the cloud using Architect

• Common Bot Misconceptions 

  Are all bots born the same?

• Serverless Slash Commands with Python 

  A step by step tutorial on how to build slash commands with Python on AWS Lambda

• Everything you ever wanted to know about unfurling but were afraid to ask /or/ How to make your site previews look amazing in Slack 

  How Slack presents helpful information about URLs

• Building slash commands on Google Cloud 

  Learn how to quickly host a slash command with node.js on Google Cloud

• Running a Slack bot on AWS using coldbrew-cli 

  Learn how to easily deploy your Dockerized bots on AWS, examples included

• /foodme: an intro to slash commands in node.js 

  Learn to program slash commands with a magic rock

• Slack client for Commodore 64 

  What can you do with a C64, a Raspberry Pi, 6502 assembly, node.js & the Slack API?

• Creating a Slack Command Bot from Scratch with Node.js & Distribute It 

  Learn how to summon in channel HTTP Status Cats while learning the basics of slash commands and working with web APIs

• How to Release Slack Bot 

  Why you should develop on Slack

• Ask these 5 questions to build a successful chatbot 

  Starting with what outcome do you want for your users?

• Designing conversational interfaces for Slack --- Lessons learned 

  Lessons learned building Moodz personal assistant Slackbot

• Sending Connection Notifications to Slack from Google Compute Engine 

  Sending Slack notifications when someone signs in to a Google Compute Engine instance

• How Manifestly implemented Sign in with Slack 

  A practical Ruby walk-through using Sign in with Slack as your identity provider

• Scaling Slack Events in Node 

  Leveraging the Events API to meet the needs of many teams

• Build a serverless Slack bot in 9 minutes with node.js and stdlib 

  Learn how stdlib makes building a Slack bot simple

• Chatbots: Your Ultimate Prototyping Tool 

  Tips on a process of building conversational bots

• Host your Slack Bot easily with Recast.AI 

  Learn how to build, host, and train intelligent bots

• Build a Slack Bot with Node.js on Kubernetes 

  This guided tutorial takes around 45 minutes to complete. Botkit is invovled.

• Creating Slack Slash Commands with AWS Lambda 

  A step by step guide to quickly handling slash command invocations using AWS Lambda & node.js

• Relax: Scale Slack Bots with Ease 

  How to stop worrying about scaling websockets

• Building Admin-Approved Apps 

  How Slack used message buttons to simplify a common workflow

• How to Build Your First Slack Bot with Python 

  Clear instructions for Pythonistas

• "Easy" desk alert button: Sending Slack alerts with an Easy Button and Feather HUZZAH 

  Hack a Staples Easy Button with an Adafruit Feather HUZZAH to send Slack alerts

• Simple Kicker Status and Reservation System With Slack Integration 

  Build an office-space game table reservation system with Raspberry Pi and Slack

• Removing Friction Between Feedback and the Customer 

  Build a customer feedback bot using AWS Lambda and SNS

• Hard questions about bot ethics 

  What are the rules that govern these our new simulacrum friends?

• Migrating to the Slack Conversations API 

  How one developer migrated from legacy methods to the Conversations API

• Building Slack Bots in Swift 

  A primer for using Swift to build a bot user using the RTM & Web APIs

• Slack and Salesforce Integration: Authentication 

  Tips on integrating Slack with Salesforce via OAuth

• How to build a Slack app 

  Just starting out? Here are some tips from a veteran Slack app developer

• Creating serverless Slack commands in minutes with Go & Up 

  Use AWS Lambda, Go, and a tool called Up to start responding to commands quickly

• Bots as a Prototyping Tool 

  Leveraging the Events API to meet the needs of many teams

• Why we built Relay, our Slack App 

  "I think entire teams would love to have this kind of transparency into user activity/engagement"

• Our experience in the Slack App Store Gold Rush 

  It's launch time for Priceonomics

• The 36 chambers (#channels?) of chat 

  Enlightening read on writing bots for the enterprise

• Week 1 of my app in the Slack App Directory 

  The developer of /todo talks much ado about the Slack App Directory

• Building a Product That is a Bot 

  5 lessons on building bot product

• Workplace reinvented: RealityHack #3 comes to a close 

  Learn how developers are finding novel ways to integrate Estimote location beacons with Slack

• Slack Your Data, Why We Created The Lookerbot for Slack 

  "Why doesn't the data appear in the conversation?"

• What Installing 15+ Slack Bots Taught Me About A Great Onboarding Experience 

  "Onboarding is one of the most important elements of a product's design."

• Low friction, High delight onboarding via Slack 

  "We wanted user on-boarding that was simple, low-friction and 'high-delight'"

• Introducing Introbot for Slack 

  "In less than 3 days we redesigned and completely rewrote Introbot with Events API."

Articles by Tag

We've tagged all this content so you can find it by your favorite language, feature, or flavor. Go ahead, have fun.

• Node.js (27)
• Bots (26)
• Slack apps (25)
• Best practices (22)
• Slash commands (20)
• Events API (17)
• Messaging (10)
• Internal integrations (9)
• Python (8)
• Conversational UI (8)
• Botkit (7)
• Amazon Lambda (7)
• Cool tricks (6)
• Message Buttons (6)
• Real Time Messaging API (5)
• Javascript (5)
• Amazon Web Services (5)
• Slack Development Kits (4)
• Slack App Directory (4)
• Development environment (4)
• Ruby (4)
• Custom integrations (3)
• Authentication and OAuth (3)
• Google Cloud Platform (3)
• Dialogs (3)
• Onboarding (2)
• Actions (2)
• Go (2)
• Heroku (2)
• Testing (2)
• Block Kit (2)
• IBM Watson (2)
• Analytics (1)
• Customer service (1)
• Amazon SNS (1)
• PHP (1)
• Swift (1)
• Docker (1)
• Productivity (1)
• Salesforce (1)
• User Experience (1)
• Location (1)
• Bolt (1)
• File management (1)