How to terminate a state machine that a user is executing?

[LamGC]

I try to add a "Cancel" command to terminate the ReplyFlow that has been executed. But I don't know how to stop the ReplyFlow that a user is running. What should I do to stop the ReplyFlow that a user is running?
(For example, delete some information in dB, or perform an operation.)

[LamGC]

Guys, I find that if I clear the list provided by bot.replies() in the action of reply, I can stop all the following processes, but is this appropriate ? ( I mean, what's the bad effect on AbilityBot )

[addo47]

That would not allow the bot to trigger any reply logic to any user. That is iterated on for when the bot processes new messages!

[addo47]

db.<Long, Integer>getMap("user_state_replies").remove(<CHAT_ID>) should reset the state. I agree that a native solution for this should be present. Can you open an issue to track this?

[LamGC]

Inside a flow, it would definitely not work. It has to be done outside the flow. Can you explain your flow here? You could technically create a terminal reply here if the user says anything that breaks the logic.

I try to execute this code in another ability (/cancel) instead of running it in the replyflow process that is being run.

This is my test code:

    public Ability test() {
        ReplyFlow botHello = ReplyFlow.builder(db())
                .onlyIf(upd -> "/test hello".equalsIgnoreCase(upd.getMessage().getText()))
                .action((bot, update) -> bot.silent().send("Hello!", update.getMessage().getChatId()))
                .next(ReplyFlow.builder(db)
                        .action((bot, upd) -> {
                            bot.silent().send("who are you?", upd.getMessage().getChatId());
                        })
                        .onlyIf(update -> "hello".equalsIgnoreCase(update.getMessage().getText()))
                        .next(Reply.of((bot, upd) -> bot.silent()
                                .send("I see. You're " + upd.getMessage().getText().substring("I am ".length()), upd.getMessage().getChatId()),
                                upd -> upd.getMessage().getText().startsWith("I am ")))
                        .build())
                .build();

        return Ability.builder()
                .name("test")
                .info("A test.")
                .locality(Locality.ALL)
                .privacy(Privacy.PUBLIC)
                .enableStats()
                .action(ctx -> silent.send("In action.", ctx.chatId()))
                .reply(botHello)
                .reply(Reply.of((bot, upd) -> silent.send("Reply 01", upd.getMessage().getChatId())))
                //.reply(Reply.of((bot, upd) -> silent.send("Reply 02", upd.getMessage().getChatId()),
                //        update -> "/test 123".equals(update.getMessage().getText())))

                .build();
    }

    public Ability cancel() {
        return Ability.builder()
                .name("cancel")
                .info("Cancel current operation.")
                .privacy(Privacy.PUBLIC)
                .locality(Locality.ALL)
                .action(ctx -> {
                    db.<Long, Integer>getMap("user_state_replies").remove(ctx.chatId());
                    silent.send("Operation cancelled.", ctx.chatId());
                })
                .build();
    }

[addo47]

The cancel ability won't ever run since you have a general reply defined above:
.reply(Reply.of((bot, upd) -> silent.send("Reply 01", upd.getMessage().getChatId())))

This line will get triggered on every message. AbilityBot doesn't process commands if any reply is executed (a design choice that I disagree with today, I think I might issue a PR for this soon).

So, remove that line and attempt to cancel. It should be fine.

[addo47]

The other suggestion is to terminate the flow. You can append another .next reply to the flow, in that flow you could have an empty action (or something that prints/sends a message) and the flags would be the counter condition. So if you're expecting a user to say "I am Name", then you could do !msg.startsWith("I am"). Then the reply will execute and it would be a terminal reply (since no more next replies are declared attached to it).

Let me know if this is unclear, I can provide an example.

[LamGC]

The other suggestion is to terminate the flow. You can append another .next reply to the flow, in that flow you could have an empty action (or something that prints/sends a message) and the flags would be the counter condition. So if you're expecting a user to say "I am Name", then you could do !msg.startsWith("I am"). Then the reply will execute and it would be a terminal reply (since no more next replies are declared attached to it).

Let me know if this is unclear, I can provide an example.

I understand, that for a short replyflow, it's a great idea to cancel the current replyflow by using the "empty operation" reply, but it may not be applied to a longer process replyflow (it may be very complicated).

[LamGC]

The cancel ability won't ever run since you have a general reply defined above:
.reply(Reply.of((bot, upd) -> silent.send("Reply 01", upd.getMessage().getChatId())))

This line will get triggered on every message. AbilityBot doesn't process commands if any reply is executed (a design choice that I disagree with today, I think I might issue a PR for this soon).

So, remove that line and attempt to cancel. It should be fine.

It works, because the unconditional reply does not stop the ReplyFlow.

Thank you very much for your reply!