TelegramR - vignette
vignette-TelegramR.RmdThe telegramR package deals with exported chats from Telegram messenger. Telegram desktop allows the user to export the data of chats and channels, but how to extract ant treat those data remains a question. This package allows the transformation of .HTML from exported chats/channels in tibble/dataframe, as well as have some functions to a brief summary about the exported chats. Check the website or the Github of the project.
Installation: Option 1 with {devtools} package
To install this package using devtools
# installing devtools
install.packages("devtools")
# installing telegramR
devtools::install_github("SoaresAlisson/telegramR")Installation: Option 2 with {remotes} package
# if remote package is installed, load it; If not, install
if (!require('remotes')) install.packages('remotes')
remotes::install_github('SoaresAlisson/telegramR')Installation: Option 3 download the files and build it locally
You go to Github, click on green bottom <> code,
than in Download Zip, unzip it, open the .Rproj in Rstudio.
Once the project is loaded, you can build the package: option1) press
ctrl+shift+b, or 2) go to Build/Install Package
Running the package
Once installed, to load the package:
You will need to have exported data from Telegram. Generally, it is at “Downloads/Telegram Desktop/”
To transform one .HTML file into tibble/dataframe, use the function
html2df("html_file")
# html2df("~/Downloads/Telegram Desktop/ChatExport_2023-12-16 (1)/messages.html")
html2df("../data/ChatExport_2023-03-17/messages.html" ) #> # A tibble: 129 × 6
#> Chat_Name msg_Id date_time user_name text Audio_Video_image
#> <chr> <chr> <dttm> <chr> <chr> <chr>
#> 1 Hacker News 176189 2024-03-01 03:28:54 Hacker News "Scient… NA
#> 2 Hacker News 176190 2024-03-01 04:03:54 Hacker News "NIST R… NA
#> 3 Hacker News 176191 2024-03-01 04:43:54 Hacker News "Positi… NA
#> 4 Hacker News 176192 2024-03-01 04:57:08 NA "Show H… NA
#> 5 Hacker News 176193 2024-03-01 05:08:54 NA "Overwh… NA
#> 6 Hacker News 176194 2024-03-01 05:33:54 Hacker News "Docusi… NA
#> 7 Hacker News 176195 2024-03-01 05:43:54 NA "Nokia … NA
#> 8 Hacker News 176196 2024-03-01 06:03:54 Hacker News "The \"… NA
#> 9 Hacker News 176197 2024-03-01 06:20:41 Hacker News "The Tr… NA
#> 10 Hacker News 176198 2024-03-01 06:38:54 Hacker News "Google… NA
#> # ℹ 119 more rowsTo get all messages from HTML in a master folder (usually
/Downloads/Telegram Desktop/) and transform all in one
single tibble, use dir2df. The function has the parameter
recursive = TRUE as default, so it is possible to
recursively find HTML files in folders inside another folders. It allows
the user to organize its chats/channels per name in folders and
subfolders.
dirTelegram <- "~/Downloads/Telegram Desktop/"
dir2df(dirTelegram)#> # A tibble: 929 × 6
#> Chat_Name msg_Id date_time user_name text Audio_Video_image
#> <chr> <chr> <dttm> <chr> <chr> <chr>
#> 1 Hacker News 176189 2024-03-01 03:28:54 Hacker News "Scient… NA
#> 2 Hacker News 176190 2024-03-01 04:03:54 Hacker News "NIST R… NA
#> 3 Hacker News 176191 2024-03-01 04:43:54 Hacker News "Positi… NA
#> 4 Hacker News 176192 2024-03-01 04:57:08 NA "Show H… NA
#> 5 Hacker News 176193 2024-03-01 05:08:54 NA "Overwh… NA
#> 6 Hacker News 176194 2024-03-01 05:33:54 Hacker News "Docusi… NA
#> 7 Hacker News 176195 2024-03-01 05:43:54 NA "Nokia … NA
#> 8 Hacker News 176196 2024-03-01 06:03:54 Hacker News "The \"… NA
#> 9 Hacker News 176197 2024-03-01 06:20:41 Hacker News "The Tr… NA
#> 10 Hacker News 176198 2024-03-01 06:38:54 Hacker News "Google… NA
#> # ℹ 919 more rows
# Counting the messages per chat_name:
dplyr::count(dirTelegramDF, Chat_Name)
#> # A tibble: 2 × 2
#> Chat_Name n
#> <chr> <int>
#> 1 Hacker News 129
#> 2 Science News Facts Updates Daily 800If you don’t want it, use the parameter
recursive = FALSE.
dir2df(dirTelegram, recursive = FALSE)
#> # A tibble: 0 × 0Organizing the exported chats/ channels.
Telegram Desktop allows the user to export channel/chats with
specific date ranges. If you exports a lot of telegram channels/chats,
the probability to become lost are high. This confusion may happens
because there is a lot of groups/channels, or because the same channel
was exported several times with different date ranges. To organize it,
the function tm_info() (telegram information) returns the
name of channel/chat, the first and the last dates in each HTML file
info_all_tm_chats <- tm_info("~/Downloads/Telegram Desktop/")
#> Warning in min.default(structure(numeric(0), class = "Date"), na.rm = FALSE):
#> no non-missing arguments to min; returning Inf
#> Warning in max.default(structure(numeric(0), class = "Date"), na.rm = FALSE):
#> no non-missing arguments to max; returning -Inf
#> Warning in min.default(structure(numeric(0), class = "Date"), na.rm = FALSE):
#> no non-missing arguments to min; returning Inf
#> Warning in max.default(structure(numeric(0), class = "Date"), na.rm = FALSE):
#> no non-missing arguments to max; returning -Inf
info_all_tm_chats
#> # A tibble: 209 × 5
#> HTMLName name UserPics FirstDate LastDate
#> <chr> <chr> <chr> <date> <date>
#> 1 ~/Downloads/Telegram Desktop/ChatExport… Hack… "" 2017-01-04 2017-01-23
#> 2 ~/Downloads/Telegram Desktop/ChatExport… Hack… "" 2017-01-23 2017-02-09
#> 3 ~/Downloads/Telegram Desktop/ChatExport… Hack… "" 2017-02-09 2017-02-26
#> 4 ~/Downloads/Telegram Desktop/ChatExport… Hack… "" 2017-02-26 2017-03-15
#> 5 ~/Downloads/Telegram Desktop/ChatExport… Hack… "" 2017-03-15 2017-04-01
#> 6 ~/Downloads/Telegram Desktop/ChatExport… Hack… "" 2017-04-01 2017-04-18
#> 7 ~/Downloads/Telegram Desktop/ChatExport… Hack… "" 2017-04-18 2017-05-05
#> 8 ~/Downloads/Telegram Desktop/ChatExport… Hack… "" 2017-05-05 2017-05-23
#> 9 ~/Downloads/Telegram Desktop/ChatExport… Hack… "" 2017-05-23 2017-06-10
#> 10 ~/Downloads/Telegram Desktop/ChatExport… Hack… "" 2017-06-10 2017-06-27
#> # ℹ 199 more rowsIn this way, if you want to export again the same chat, it is easy to know the last date of the last export. To make it even easier:
filter_last_export(info_all_tm_chats)
#> # A tibble: 2 × 2
#> name LastDate
#> <chr> <date>
#> 1 Hacker News 2023-12-16
#> 2 Science News Facts Updates Daily 2023-12-19But pay attention that if you export the same chat/channel at least
twice, and with a time gap between them, the function
filter_last_export will not identify this gap.