Prerequisites

2. Before You Start — Prerequisites

Before you use Rufoof, you need to have the following ready:

A Telegram Account

You need an active Telegram account. Telegram is available on Android, iOS, Windows, macOS, and Linux. If you do not have Telegram installed, download it from telegram.org.

A Telegram Bot

You will create a bot using Telegram's official bot creation tool called BotFather. This is covered step by step in Create Your Bot.

A bot is what your users will interact with. It has a username (like @mylibrary_bot) and a token (a long secret code that gives Rufoof permission to control it).

A Telegram Channel (Private)

You will create a private Telegram channel. This channel acts as the storage for your files — Rufoof uploads all your files to it behind the scenes. Your users never see this channel directly; they only interact with your bot. This is covered in Create Your Channel.

Your Files, Organized in a Folder

Prepare a folder on your computer containing all the files you want to serve through your bot. You can organize files into subfolders — Rufoof will preserve your folder structure as a navigable menu for your users.

File size limit: Each individual file must be 50 MB or smaller. This is a Telegram limitation. Rufoof will warn you if any file exceeds this limit and give you options to upload them manually.

Folder button limit: Each folder (and the root level) must contain fewer than 100 items (files + subfolders combined). If a folder exceeds 99 items, Rufoof will warn you and skip that folder. The bot itself can have more than 100 items in total, but not all directly placed in a single folder.