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Telegram Readonly

  • 4 installs
  • 1 repo stars
  • Updated July 29, 2026
  • ropl-btc/agent-skills

Helps with ai & agent building tasks.

About

telegram-readonly is a Claude Code skill for ai & agent building. It helps solo builders move faster with AI-assisted development.

  • telegram-readonly
  • AI & Agent Building
  • AI-coding skill

Telegram Readonly by the numbers

  • 4 all-time installs (skills.sh)
  • Ranked #13,372 of 16,546 AI & Agent Building skills by installs in the Skillselion catalog
  • Data as of Aug 5, 2026 (Skillselion catalog sync)
npx skills add https://github.com/ropl-btc/agent-skills --skill telegram-readonly

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Listed on Skillselion
Installs4
repo stars1
Last updatedJuly 29, 2026
Repositoryropl-btc/agent-skills

What it does

Helps with ai & agent building tasks.

Files

SKILL.mdMarkdownGitHub ↗

Telegram Readonly

Use the local skill script for Telegram reads from the user's personal account.

This skill exists because Telegram Bot API is the wrong tool for reading a real personal account. Use MTProto via Telethon instead.

Quick rules

  • Use this skill only for reads.
  • Do not improvise write actions.
  • Do not add send/edit/delete logic to the wrapper unless the user explicitly asks.
  • Treat the Telethon session like a high-privilege secret.
  • Assume unread preservation is best-effort until tested on a real chat.

Local setup

Prefer the skill-local script and a skill-local virtual environment over any global CLI install. Prefer saved Telegram config over shell-exported environment variables once setup is complete. Treat .venv as generated local state, not part of the skill itself. If the installer drops skill-local dotfiles, the bootstrap script recreates .gitignore automatically.

Bootstrap the local environment:

<skill-path>/scripts/bootstrap_venv.sh

After bootstrap, use:

<skill-path>/scripts/telegram-readonly

If .venv is missing later, just run the bootstrap script again.

Primary config path:

~/.config/telegram-readonly/config.json

Recommended one-time setup:

1. Make sure api_id and api_hash are available. 2. Run:

<skill-path>/scripts/telegram-readonly auth

After successful login, the config file stores api_id, api_hash, and the Telegram session string so future reads do not need exported shell variables.

Commands

Show built-in help

<skill-path>/scripts/telegram-readonly help

Authenticate once

export TELEGRAM_API_ID='12345678'
export TELEGRAM_API_HASH='your_api_hash'
<skill-path>/scripts/telegram-readonly auth

List chats

dialogs --query does token-based matching across name, username, and title, so queries like petros skynet work even when the exact full string is not present as one substring.

<skill-path>/scripts/telegram-readonly dialogs --limit 50

Read recent messages

<skill-path>/scripts/telegram-readonly messages --chat '@username' --limit 50 --reverse

Search messages

<skill-path>/scripts/telegram-readonly search 'invoice' --limit 50

Restrict search to one chat:

<skill-path>/scripts/telegram-readonly search 'deadline' --chat '@username' --limit 50

List recent unread chats

Default behavior is opinionated: exclude muted and archived chats.

<skill-path>/scripts/telegram-readonly unread-dialogs --limit 10

Include muted and/or archived when needed:

<skill-path>/scripts/telegram-readonly unread-dialogs --limit 10 --include-muted --include-archived

List recent unread DMs only

<skill-path>/scripts/telegram-readonly unread-dms --limit 10

Workflow

1. Read references/setup-and-safety.md if setup, auth, or unread-state behavior matters. 2. Ensure the skill-local virtual environment is bootstrapped. 3. Ensure Telegram API credentials exist. 4. Run auth once to create the session and write ~/.config/telegram-readonly/config.json. 5. Use dialogs, messages, search, unread-dialogs, or unread-dms as needed. 6. Keep usage narrow and intentional.

Expected outputs

The wrapper returns JSON. Parse it instead of relying on fragile text scraping.

Dialog objects include:

  • is_user
  • is_group
  • is_channel
  • is_bot
  • archived
  • muted
  • unread counters

Files

  • Package repo: https://github.com/ropl-btc/telegram-readonly-cli
  • Launcher: scripts/telegram-readonly
  • Python implementation: scripts/telegram_readonly.py
  • Local bootstrap: scripts/bootstrap_venv.sh
  • Setup notes: references/setup-and-safety.md
  • Config storage: ~/.config/telegram-readonly/config.json
  • .env is optional fallback only; it is not the preferred long-term setup.
  • .venv/ is generated local state and can be recreated with scripts/bootstrap_venv.sh.

When to stop and ask

Stop and ask before:

  • adding write capabilities
  • enabling any background watcher/daemon
  • broad exporting of large chat histories
  • changing how secrets/session storage works

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