signai

A chatbot for Signal that answers with OpenAI models.

Commands

• chat <text> — ask the bot, e.g. chat How are you?
• chatctx — show the current dialog history
• chatrm — clear the dialog history

Replying directly to one of the bot's messages counts as chat, so the command can be left out.

Installation

mkdir signai && cd signai && \
  curl -fsSL \
    -o compose.yaml https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Helltar/signai/master/compose.yaml \
    -o .env https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Helltar/signai/master/.env.example

Set OPENAI_API_KEY and SIGNAL_PHONE_NUMBER in .env.

Signal account

The bot reaches Signal through signal-cli-rest-api, which runs alongside it. Before starting the bot, link that service to the Signal account the bot will use.

Link the account as a second device:

1. Start a one-off instance with a temporary port bound to localhost:

   docker compose run --rm -p 127.0.0.1:8080:8080 signal-cli-rest-api

2. Open http://localhost:8080/v1/qrcodelink?device_name=signal-api in a browser.

3. On the phone holding the account: Settings → Linked devices → +, and scan the QR code.

4. Wait for signal-api to appear under Linked devices, then press Ctrl+C in the terminal. The one-off container is removed and its host port is closed; the linked account remains in the shared Docker volume.

5. Start the bot and its Signal service:

   docker compose up -d

That's it — once the containers are running, the bot is ready to use.