Chapter 02: About Packages

How bots are organized in General Bots.

What You’ll Learn

Package structure (.gbai folders)
Dialog scripts in BASIC
Knowledge bases
Configuration basics
How packages load

Package Structure

A bot is just a folder ending in .gbai:

my-bot.gbai/
├── my-bot.gbdialog/    # BASIC scripts
├── my-bot.gbkb/        # Documents
├── my-bot.gbot/        # Configuration
├── my-bot.gbtheme/     # Optional styling
└── my-bot.gbdrive/     # Optional storage

Drop the folder in templates/, it loads automatically.

Key Concepts

Dialogs (.gbdialog)

BASIC scripts that control conversation
start.bas is optional (but needed to activate tools/KB with USE TOOL/USE KB)
Simple commands like TALK and HEAR

Knowledge Base (.gbkb)

Put PDFs and documents in folders
Automatically becomes searchable
Bot can answer questions from documents

Configuration (.gbot)

Single config.csv file
Simple name,value pairs
Missing values use defaults

Themes (.gbtheme)

Optional CSS styling
Most bots don’t need this

Storage (.gbdrive)

Links to S3-compatible storage
For large files and uploads

How It Works

Discovery: Finds .gbai folders
Loading: Reads all components
Indexing: Processes documents
Activation: Bot is ready

No build process. No compilation. Just folders and files.

The web UI uses HTMX with server-side rendering - minimal JavaScript, no build process, just HTML templates powered by Rust.

Topics Covered

.gbai Architecture - Package details
.gbdialog Dialogs - BASIC scripting
.gbkb Knowledge Base - Document management
.gbot Configuration - Settings
.gbtheme UI Theming - Styling
.gbdrive File Storage - Storage integration
Bot Templates - Example bots

General Bots