Loading .env file from within hubot

Hubot currently uses environment variables to configure the hubot instance. bootstrap files also show the ability to load from .env. Example:

# Load environment specific environment variables
if [ -f .env ]; then
  source .env
fi

This works as long as the .env file has export in front of all the variables.
export HUBOT_SLACK_TOKEN=xoxb-xxxxxxxxxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Common node.js practice is to use modules like dotenv or node-env-file to load variables from .env in the format HUBOT_SLACK_TOKEN=xoxb-xxxxxxxxxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

But that format does not work with the source .env method above.

Adding node-env-file to bin/hubot would resolve this issue and be compatible with current functionality

env      = require 'node-env-file'
env('.env', {verbose: false, raise: false})

This will

• only load items in .ssh that do not have export in front of them ( so will not conflict with existing .env files being sourced )
• not overwrite any environment variables that are already populated via the environment

[SabareeshIyer]

Hi. I fixed it. For anybody who’s fixing the same problem: Open up PowerShell and set environment variables like so: [Environment]::SetEnvironmentVariable("HUBOT_ADAPTER", "slack", "Machine") [Environment]::SetEnvironmentVariable("HUBOT_SLACK_TOKEN", "xoxb-xxx-xxx"", "Machine")

Did the job.

[twellspring]

Tests

Gets read

.env

HUBOT_SLACK_TOKEN=xoxb-xxxxxxxxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Results

# bin/hubot -a slack
[Mon Mar 21 2016 10:00:41 GMT-0700 (PDT)] INFO Connecting...
[Mon Mar 21 2016 10:00:42 GMT-0700 (PDT)] INFO Logged in as hubot of xxxxx, but not yet connected
[Mon Mar 21 2016 10:00:43 GMT-0700 (PDT)] INFO Slack client now connected

Not read if export

.env

export HUBOT_SLACK_TOKEN=xoxb-xxxxxxxxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Results

# bin/hubot -a slack
[Mon Mar 21 2016 10:03:00 GMT-0700 (PDT)] ERROR No services token provided to Hubot

Will not overwrite

bin/hubot

export HUBOT_SLACK_TOKEN=xoxb-xxxxxxxxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
exec node_modules/.bin/hubot --name "hubot" --alias "!"  "$@"

.env

HUBOT_SLACK_TOKEN=this-is-a-bad-token

Results

# bin/hubot -a slack
HUBOT_SLACK_TOKEN
[Mon Mar 21 2016 09:54:08 GMT-0700 (PDT)] INFO Connecting...
[Mon Mar 21 2016 09:54:10 GMT-0700 (PDT)] INFO Logged in as hubot of xxxxxx, but not yet connected
[Mon Mar 21 2016 09:54:10 GMT-0700 (PDT)] INFO Slack client now connected