Discord Companion Bot: Running It in Production
The Discord integration is bidirectional. WordPress → Discord works on its own once you’ve entered your bot token and channel. The other direction – Discord replies reaching your visitors – needs the small companion Node.js bot (bot/discord-bot.js) running on a server. This guide covers deploying, updating, and maintaining it.
For the initial Discord connection (bot token, channel ID, permissions), see the Discord Integration Setup Guide. This guide picks up at “now keep the relay bot running.”
What the bot does
It logs into Discord, watches the threads under your configured channel, and when a (non-bot) human posts a reply it POSTs that message to your site’s /wp-json/ssc/v1/discord/incoming endpoint, authenticated with a shared secret. WordPress maps the thread back to the conversation and inserts the reply as an admin message, which the visitor sees on their next poll.
Requirements
- Node.js 18+ on a machine that can reach your WordPress site over HTTPS.
- The
bot/folder from the plugin (discord-bot.js,package.json,env-example). - Your bot token, channel ID, site endpoint URL, and webhook secret (all shown on the Discord settings tab under “Bot Connection Info”).
On Windows, follow Discord Companion Bot on Windows instead: it covers PowerShell, Task Scheduler and the Windows-specific pitfalls.
Setup
cp -r wp-content/plugins/super-speedy-chat/bot /opt/ssc-bot
cd /opt/ssc-bot
npm install
mv env-example .env
# edit .env with your values.env keys (if your bot/ folder has no env-example, create .env with these four lines):
DISCORD_BOT_TOKEN=... # the bot token
DISCORD_CHANNEL_ID=... # the channel whose threads to watch
WP_ENDPOINT_URL=https://example.com/wp-json/ssc/v1/discord/incoming
WP_WEBHOOK_SECRET=... # the secret shown on the Discord settings tabThe bot refuses to start if any value is missing or still contains a your_… placeholder.
Keeping it running
Run it under a process manager so it restarts on crash/reboot.
Use a process manager (PM2 or systemd below), never a bare node discord-bot.js in a terminal. The bot must survive crashes and reboots, otherwise Discord replies silently stop reaching visitors the next time the server restarts and nobody notices until a customer complains.
PM2
npm install -g pm2
pm2 start discord-bot.js --name ssc-discord-bot
pm2 save
pm2 startup # follow the printed instruction to enable on bootLogs: pm2 logs ssc-discord-bot.
systemd
# /etc/systemd/system/ssc-discord-bot.service
[Unit]
Description=Super Speedy Chat Discord relay bot
After=network.target
[Service]
WorkingDirectory=/opt/ssc-bot
ExecStart=/usr/bin/node discord-bot.js
Restart=always
RestartSec=5
User=www-data
[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.targetsudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl enable --now ssc-discord-bot
journalctl -u ssc-discord-bot -f # logsUpdating the bot
When you update the plugin, the bot files may change. Re-copy discord-bot.js and package.json (your .env is separate and untouched), reinstall dependencies, and restart:
cp wp-content/plugins/super-speedy-chat/bot/discord-bot.js wp-content/plugins/super-speedy-chat/bot/package.json /opt/ssc-bot/
cd /opt/ssc-bot && npm install
pm2 restart ssc-discord-bot # or: systemctl restart ssc-discord-botThen click Test Connection on the Discord tab. Check 10, “Companion bot answers”, passes when the updated bot is running, watching the right channel and using the right secret; the bot logs Answered a Test Connection from WordPress.
Rotating the webhook secret
The shared secret authenticates the bot to WordPress. If it’s ever exposed:
- Change/regenerate it on the WordPress side (the Discord settings tab shows the current secret).
- Update
WP_WEBHOOK_SECRETin the bot’s.env. - Restart the bot.
Until both sides match, inbound relays return 401 and Discord replies won’t reach visitors.
Troubleshooting
| Symptom | Likely cause |
|---|---|
| Test Connection check 10 fails | The bot is not running, watches a different channel, cannot reach WordPress, or its discord-bot.js is older than 1.1.0. The result names a wrong secret. See Testing the connection. |
Bot logs WordPress returned 401 | Secret mismatch – re-sync .env with the settings tab. |
Bot logs WordPress returned 404 | The Discord thread isn’t mapped to a conversation (e.g. a thread not created by the integration). |
| Replies in Discord do nothing | Bot not running, watching the wrong DISCORD_CHANNEL_ID, or Message Content Intent not enabled on the bot. |
| Bot won’t start | A missing/placeholder value in .env, or an invalid token. |
| Visitor → Discord works but not the reverse | That’s expected without the bot – the bot powers only the Discord → WordPress direction. |
The most common “the bot runs but nothing happens” cause is Message Content Intent left off in the Discord Developer Portal. Without it, Discord delivers your bot empty message bodies, so it has nothing to relay. Enable it under your application’s Bot settings, then restart the bot.
Security notes
- Treat
.envas a secret – it holds your bot token and webhook secret. Lock down file permissions and keep it out of version control. - Run the bot over HTTPS to your site so the secret isn’t sent in clear text.
- The bot needs no inbound ports; it makes outbound connections only (to Discord and to your site).
Further reading
/discord/incoming endpoint the bot posts to
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