AQIDuck

NOTE:

This is very data-intensive because it polls the API too frequently, and doesn't batch requests. If you want to use this I would recommend updating it for the new API calls. I am no longer using it myself. Feel free to branch and enjoy!

Purpose:

• Pull data from PurpleAir
• Report to Slack about air quality and temperature based on the channel topic
• Monitor AQI to let you know when it's safe to go outside or no longer safe to go outside based on thresholds you set
• Or Monitor AQI dynamically to let you know when AQI is trending up or down

Future additions:

• v2 will allow users to install the app on their slack instance from the app directory

Requirements:

This version requires some minor devops knowledge and understanding of how to get a slackbot up and running

• You must run the code off of some kind of server that has node on it
• You must be able to create a slackbot and set up slackbot event subscriptions

To install:

• Pull the code down onto your server
• Bundle running yarn install and run yarn build-ts to build the typescript files
• Get a PurpleAir API Key
• create a slackbot with the permissions app_mentions:read, channels:read, chat:write, channels:history, groups:read
• Set up slack event subscriptions:
  • expose a port and calling: ./node_modules/.bin/slack-verify --secret [Signing secret] --port [you pick the port, default 3000]
  • Put the URL of your app in the Event subscriptions part of the slack setup
  • You can find the signing secret in the basic information part of your slack setup
  • Subscribe to the events app_mention, channel_left, member_joined_channel, message.channels
  • cancel the slack-verify server so you can use that same port for the bot
• Make sure you have all the environment variables set up listed in the example.env
• Start the server using node . or running the dist/index.js file

To set up:

• invite the slackbot to various channels
• set the channel topic to include a JSON string about which PurpleAir sensors should be monitored, for example:

Whatever channel topic you want to write

***{"sensors": [{"name": "Sesame Street", "type": "PurpleAir", "id": 12345}]}***

Monitoring:

If you want your sensor to let you know if the AQI crosses specific boundaries, add AQIThresholds to the topic JSON like so: {"sensors": [{"name": "Whatever", "type": "PurpleAir", "id": 12345, "AQIThresholds":[50,80]}]} Note this currently doesn't validate that the first number is less than the second, and only looks at the first two items.

If you want your sensor to let you know whenever the AQI goes up or down by 5, set AQIMonitoring to dynamic: {"sensors": [{"name": "Whatever", "type": "PurpleAir", "id": 12345, "AQIMonitoring":"dynamic"}]}

If you want your sensor to let you know whenever the AQI crosses to a new category (e.g Good, Unhealthy), set AQIMonitoring to category: {"sensors": [{"name": "Whatever", "type": "PurpleAir", "id": 12345, "AQIMonitoring":"category"}]}

The bot will reload its configuration whenever the channel topic changes.

To talk to the bot:

• @AQIDuck report gives you the report
• @AQIDuck stop monitoring stops the monitoring
• @AQIDuck resume monitoring resumes the monitoring
• @AQIDuck hello says hi
• @AQIDuck reload reolads the config from the channel topic (this should happen automatically anyway)

To find your PurpleAir sensor ID:

• On the PurpleAir map, click on the sensor you're interested in
• The sensor ID will be in the URL:
• At the bottom of the widget with the air quality, hover over "Get This Widget"
• The ID in the div of the widget also contains the sensor ID