🤖 From Using Bots to Building One

🧩 So, What Changed?

In the last post, I talked about this cool bot I found — a Telegram bot that handed out disposable emails and pinged you when you got mail. Super handy. But using that tool sparked something deeper:

"Why not build my own bot?"

Spoiler alert: I did.

⚙️ What I Wanted To Build

I wanted a bot that wasn’t just a gimmick — something that:

🤝 Responds to commands like /start, /help, and /about
🧠 Remembers user sessions and states
📨 Lets users send a fake email from Telegram to an actual inbox
🚀 Maybe, just maybe, automate future workflows with buttons, menus, and replies

Basically, I wanted it to feel less like a bot and more like a cyber sidekick.

🔧 Tools & Stack

Language: Python 3
Bot Framework: python-telegram-bot
Hosting: Railway (yes, I’m cheap and lazy)
Email Relay: Integrated with SMTP for outbound fake emails
Extras: Markdown formatting, async functions, and custom keyboards for replies

🛠️ The Build Process (With Dumb Mistakes I Made)

Step 1: Setting Up the Bot Token 🔑

Grabbed the token from @botfather (yes, still feels like talking to mafia). Put it in a .env file — lesson learned from hardcoding it once and almost pushing to GitHub. 😅

Step 2: Basic Command Handling 🚦

Wired up /start, /help, and /reset. Pretty straightforward.

@bot.message_handler(commands=['start'])
def send_welcome(message):
    bot.reply_to(message, "Hey, I'm your cyber mailman. Type /help to see what I do.")

Step 3: Sending Emails via Telegram 📤

Hooked up the backend with SMTP. Had the user enter subject ➝ recipient ➝ body — in that order.

Also added some basic validation because people type like goblins.

Step 4: Buttons & Flow ✨

Instead of plain text, I used Telegram inline buttons. So now, it’s tap-and-go instead of sending a wall of text.

InlineKeyboardButton("Send New Email", callback_data='send_email')

🧠 What I Learned

How to use inline queries and callback handlers
That bot UX is way harder than expected
Sending emails from bots is easy, validating human input is not
Hosting bots that don't go offline is a full-time job

🚀 Future Plans

Add a dashboard for viewing sent emails
Schedule emails using cron
Integrate with GPT for auto-generating email replies 🤯
Maybe… maybe even turn it into a public utility?

TL;DR

I used a Telegram bot.
I liked it.
I built my own bot.
It sends fake emails and talks like me.

Moral of the story? Curiosity + caffeine = shipping cool shit.

Built with 💻, ☕, and a hint of "I wonder if this breaks..."

Link?
Have it: https://t.me/mailer3000bot?start=_tgr_nrqbUw5iYWRl

PanicAtTheKernel @panicatthekernel