bot

Unified Auctions bot

What is "Unified Auctions Bot"?

"Unified Auctions Bot" is a server-side application with two distinct functionalities:

• Twitter bot – a script that periodically fetches collateral auctions and publish a tweet if it finds a new auction
• Keeper bot – a script that periodically fetches collateral auctions and their market values, and if it finds that any of them are profitable, executes respective transactions (authorizations and bidding)

The bots can be hosted by any user, provided, they configure related environment variables. For more details, please refer to Environment variables section below.

Setup

# install dependencies
$ npm install

# serve with hot reload at localhost:3000
$ npm run dev

# build for production and launch server
$ npm run build
$ npm run start

Environment variables

• RPC_URL: (required) Etherium RPC url used for fetching data from the blockchain and participating in the auctions
• SUPPORTED_AUCTION_TYPES: (optional, default COLLATERAL, SURPLUS, DEBT) a comma-separated list of auction types the bot will interact with
• WHITELISTED_COLLATERALS: (optional) a comma-separated list of collaterals the bot will fetch. Example: MATIC-A, UNI-A
• MAX_PRIORITY_FEE_PER_GAS_WEI: (optional, default can be found in core/src/gas.ts) – EIP-1559 max_priority_fee_per_gas value
• REFETCH_INTERVAL: (optional, default 60 seconds) – interval between auction fetching requests
• KEEPER_*: (optional) set of env variables to enable keeper bot:
  • KEEPER_WALLET_PRIVATE_KEY: (required) The wallet private key (https://metamask.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/360015289632-How-to-Export-an-Account-Private-Key)
  • KEEPER_COLLATERAL_MINIMUM_NET_PROFIT_DAI: (required to run keeper on collateral auctions) The minimum net profit a collateral auction must yield before the keeper automatically bids on it. Can be negative if one is willing to spend ETH on transaction fees to keep DAI stable
  • KEEPER_SURPLUS_MINIMUM_NET_PROFIT_DAI: (required to run keeper on surplus auctions) The minimum net profit a surplus auction must yield before the keeper automatically bids on it. Can be negative if one is willing to spend ETH on transaction fees to keep DAI stable
  • KEEPER_DEBT_MINIMUM_NET_PROFIT_DAI: (required to run keeper on debt auctions) The minimum net profit a debt auction must yield before the keeper automatically bids on it. The net profit is computed based on the MKR price on Uniswap minus expected transaction fees. Nut the outcome of the transaction does not automatically converted into DAI. The number can be negative if one is willing to spend ETH on transaction fees to keep DAI stable
  • KEEPER_PREAUTHORIZE: (optional, default false) if set to true, the wallet will execute all required authorizations (for DAI and collateralals) on start. Default behaviour is to wait until specific auction is profitable and then execute authorizations only required for the particular auction. Note that it's recommended to set this to true only in combination with WHITELISTED_COLLATERALS
• TWITTER_*: (optional) set of env variables to enable twitter bot. Created via twitter developer account with OAuth 1.0a Elevated access and Read and Write permissions:
  • TWITTER_API_KEY: (required)
  • TWITTER_API_SECRET: (required)
  • TWITTER_ACCESS_TOKEN: (required)
  • TWITTER_ACCESS_SECRET: (required)
  • FRONTEND_ORIGIN: (required) The auction UI origin for the tweet (valid example: https://auctions.makerdao.network)

Notes:

• Env variables are accessible via the secret command under auction-ui/${environment}/bot
• In order to provide environment variables to the bot inside the CI, they have to be available at runtime. For this:

1. modify https://github.com/sidestream-tech/k8s-projects/blob/main/auctions-ui/staging/values-bot.yml file, externalSecrets variable to include name and path to value like - name: rpc_url with ssmPath: /auction-ui/main.auction-ui.k8s.sidestream.tech/bot/rpc_url on the next line

Development Setup

Please see this centralized guide to get started with your development setup. Namely, you should:

• have a minimum node and npm version (see package.json engine section)
• have a certain formatting and linting setup
• don't forget to create ./bot/.env file

Help on both things is given in the linked resources above.

Production Setup

Testing scenario:

1. Create ./bot/.env file all variables from auction-ui/bot/staging or auction-ui/bot/production
2. Start the project in production mode, i.e.: npm run build && npm start or using docker image
3. Restart auction on goerli using frontend
4. Check the logs for the tweet message and its url

Using the Dockerfile:

Run the following commands:

# 1. Build the docker image
> docker build -t auction-ui-bot -f Dockerfile ..

# 2. Generate temporary AWS credentials
> aws-vault exec YOUR_AWS_ACCOUNT_NAME -- env  | grep AWS > .env

# 3. Start the bot
> docker run  --env-file .env auction-ui-bot