Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Can Sporks learn phrases in other languages than English?

Not at present. Because Sporks relies on being able to look at the structure of a sentence to determine what a declarative statement is, it won't know how to learn from e.g. Spanish or Japanese. However, it is planned at a later date to add support for various languages.

Where do I report offensive or abusive phrases stored in the bot?

Much like Wikipedia, Sporks is very effectively community moderated, and as anyone has access to add abusive phrases (and there will always be bad actors that do such things) anyone also has access to remove these abusive phrases too, so simply tell Sporks to forget the offending information, and it's gone forever. However, if there is continued abuse of the service, and you feel unable to do anything or victimised, approach us on the official discord server and we will be happy to assist you in taking more punitive action against abuse.

Can I add responses that are only for my own server?

You can't do this via simple teaching of facts, if you want to do this you should look into adding channel-specific responses using the Sporks JavaScript API.

I just want a blank bot, not one with nearly 20 years of history in it. How do I do this?

To do this you'd have to self-host the bot. We don't directly support this, so although the source code is here, you're on your own and it'll take some knowledge of MySQL, compiling C++ programs from source on Linux, and Linux itself.

Where is Sporks hosted?

Sporks is hosted on a dedicated server at OVH.

Can I donate to the project?

Yes, to do this you should sign up through our patreon starting at only $3 per month. All donations are welcomed and will be put to good use.

Can I contribute to development of Sporks?

Yes, pull requests to this project are always welcome.

How do I make my JavaScript scripts available for everyone to use in Sporks?

The official way is simply upload them to codebottle - once you have uploaded your script, tag it with the discord-sporks tag within codebottle's UI. This will allow Sporks to find the script and bring it up within the "Download Scripts" page. If you wanted, you could also create your own unofficial listing of scripts and share them via copy and paste.

If I vote for Sporks on a bot list site, what do I get?

If you vote for Sporks on one of the many sites that support it, you'll get a special role on the official support server which allows you access to voter-only text and high quality voice channels. More perks will follow at a later date.

Why is Sporks telling me to "make my own sandwich"?!

An "embed" message telling you to make your own sandwich means that Sporks thinks you're issuing a command which is reserved only for the bot's developer and is used to reload modules, restart the bot, etc.

Who develops Sporks?

Sporks is developed and created by Craig Edwards, the sole developer for Brainbox.cc, an indie game development studio and open source contributor for many years. If you want to find out more about other Brainbox.cc projects please visit the brainbox.cc website.

Where did Sporks learn 5 million facts from?

Sporks has learned from many sources, mainly IRC, on the ChatSpike IRC network, FreeNode, and other places over nearly two decades. Other sources of information include publicly available IRC logs from other networks, and public domain works of literature from places such as Project Gutenberg.

Can I add bulk information to Sporks such as literature, or my own logs?

You can't do this yourself, but please do get in touch via the official discord and i'd be happy to feed this information into Sporks for you.

Where do i report security issues regarding the bot, or its data?

Please send me a DM on discord (Brain#0001). You may need to join the official discord server too. All security issues are dealt with as a matter of priority, and in strictest confidence.