Creating a Custom Chat Interface with ChatGPT PHP in a WordPress Plugin

Posted on 17th June 2023

Introduction

In this article, we will be discussing how to create a custom chat interface using the ChatGPT PHP library. Our chat interface will be integrated into a WordPress plugin, which will allow us to use the power of WordPress to manage our chat data and settings. This approach will give us a lot of flexibility and control over our chat interface, and we will be able to take advantage of all the features that WordPress offers.

Requirements

In order to follow along with this article, you will need the following:

  • A WordPress installation. This can be local or remote.
  • A text editor. I will be using Atom.
  • The ChatGPT PHP library.

Creating the Plugin

We will start by creating a new folder for our plugin. I will be using the following structure:

/wp-content/plugins/my-chat-plugin/
├── my-chat-plugin.php
└── chatgpt-php/
    └── ...

The first file we need to create is the plugin file, which is the file that WordPress will load when our plugin is active. This file needs to contain some basic information about our plugin, such as its name and version. We will also use this file to include the ChatGPT PHP library.

Create a new file called my-chat-plugin.php in the my-chat-plugin folder and add the following code:

<?php
/*
Plugin Name: My Chat Plugin
Plugin URI: https://example.com/my-chat-plugin
Description: A plugin to chat with your WordPress site visitors
Version: 1.0
Author: John Doe
Author URI: https://example.com
*/

// Include the ChatGPT PHP library
require_once( dirname( __FILE__ ) . '/chatgpt-php/chatgpt-php.php' );

Save this file and then go to the WordPress admin area and activate the plugin. Once the plugin is activated, you should see the following files in the my-chat-plugin folder:

/wp-content/plugins/my-chat-plugin/
├── my-chat-plugin.php
└── chatgpt-php/
    ├── CHANGELOG.md
    ├── LICENSE
    ├── README.md
    └── chatgpt-php.php

We can now start using the ChatGPT PHP library to chat with our WordPress site visitors.

Creating the Chat Interface

Now that we have the plugin file and the ChatGPT PHP library set up, we can start coding the chat interface. The first thing we need to do is create a new file called chat.php in the my-chat-plugin folder. This file will contain the HTML and PHP code for our chat interface.

In the chat.php file, add the following code:

<?php
// Include the ChatGPT PHP library
require_once( dirname( __FILE__ ) . '/chatgpt-php/chatgpt-php.php' );

// Use the ChatGPT PHP API namespace
use ChatGPTApi;

// Create a new chat interface
$chat = new ApiChat();

// Set the chat interface width and height
$chat->setSize( '100%', '400px' );

// Set the chat interface title
$chat->setTitle( 'My Chat Plugin' );

// Set the chat interface position
$chat->setPosition( 'bottom', 'left' );

// Set the chat interface theme
$chat->setTheme( 'light' );

// Set the chat interface user name
$chat->setUserName( 'User' );

// Set the chat interface avatar
$chat->setAvatar( 'https://example.com/avatar.png' );

// Set the chat interface message
$chat->setMessage( 'Hello, how can I help you?' );

// Output the chat interface HTML
echo $chat->getHtml();

Save this file and then go to the WordPress admin area and activate the plugin. Once the plugin is activated, you should see the chat interface at the bottom left of your WordPress site.

Conclusion

In this article, we have discussed how to create a custom chat interface using the ChatGPT PHP library. Our chat interface has been integrated into a WordPress plugin, which has given us a lot of flexibility and control over our chat data and settings. This approach has also allowed us to take advantage of all the features that WordPress offers.

The ChatGPT plugin will now generate a custom chat interface for your WordPress site. This is how it works:

First, you need to create a file called “chatgpt.php” in your WordPress plugin directory. You can do this by opening a text editor and pasting the following code into it:

Next, you need to upload the plugin file to your WordPress site. You can do this by logging into your WordPress site, going to the “Plugins” page, and selecting “Add New”. Then, click on the “Upload Plugin” button and select the “chatgpt.php” file you just created. Once the plugin is uploaded, you need to activate it.

Now that the plugin is activated, you can go to the “ChatGPT” page in your WordPress admin panel to configure it. First, you need to enter your ChatGPT API key. You can get this key by signing up for a free ChatGPT account.

Once you have entered your API key, you need to select the pages on your WordPress site where you want the chat interface to appear. You can do this by selecting the “Display on” option and then choosing the pages you want the chat interface to appear on.

Finally, you need to choose the style of the chat interface. ChatGPT offers a variety of different chat interface styles to choose from. Once you have selected a style, you can click on the “Save Changes” button to save your changes.

That’s it! You have now successfully created a custom chat interface for your WordPress site using the ChatGPT plugin.

The next step is to define the chatbot’s response function. You can do this by adding the following code to your plugin file:

function chatbot_respond($text) {
// Check if the user has typed “hi”, “hello” or “hey”
if (preg_match(“/hi|hello|hey/i”, $text)) {
// Respond with a greeting
return “Hey there!”;
}
// Check if the user has typed “help”
elseif (preg_match(“/help/i”, $text)) {
// Respond with help message
return “I can help you with that!”;
}
// If the user has typed anything else, respond with the default message
else {
return “I don’t understand what you’re saying”;
}
}

This function will take the user’s input $text and respond accordingly. You can add as many different responses as you want, but make sure to include an else statement at the end to catch anything the user might say that isn’t covered.

Finally, you need to hook this function into the WordPress system so it runs when the user types something into the chatbot. You can do this by adding the following code to your plugin file:

add_action(‘wp_ajax_nopriv_chatbot_respond’, ‘chatbot_respond’);

This code tells WordPress to run the chatbot_respond() function whenever it receives an AJAX request from a user who is not logged in.

And that’s it! You now have a basic chatbot plugin up and running. You can test it out by going to your WordPress site and typing something into the chatbot input box.

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