Companion repo for “Goodbye World, Hello Battlesnake” (Commit Your Code Conference)

This project shows how to build a tiny tinyhttp Battlesnake server, then add strategy control over WebSockets using Twilio Conversation Relay and a local LLM (Ollama).

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What you need

• Node.js 18+
• pnpm (preferred): npm i -g pnpm
• ngrok (to expose localhost:3000)
• Twilio (Programmable Voice + Conversation Relay)
  – a Twilio account and a voice-enabled phone number
• Ollama (for local LLM): https://ollama.com/ – run ollama serve and pull the required model:

  ollama pull qwen2.5:1.5b

Create a .env (based on .env.example):

NGROK_URL=https://your-subdomain.ngrok.app

NGROK_URL is used to form public callback / WS URLs for Twilio & Battlesnake.

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Install

pnpm install

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Run the demos

Each file in demo/ is standalone and builds on the previous one:

# Demo 1: Hello Battlesnake (basic server)
npm run 1

# Demo 2: LLM Move (creative strategy interpretation with qwen2.5:1.5b)
npm run 2

# Demo 3: Voice Control (Twilio voice updates strategy)
npm run 3

# Demo 4: Full Snake (voice + colors + streaming commentary)
npm run 4
# or
npm start

# Development mode (auto-reload)
npm run dev

Servers listen on http://localhost:3000.

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Expose with ngrok

ngrok http 3000

Copy the https URL into .env as NGROK_URL.

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Project structure

.
├─ demo/
│  ├─ 1-hello.js       - Basic Battlesnake server
│  ├─ 2-llmmove.js     - LLM-powered movement
│  ├─ 3-voicesnake.js  - Voice control via Twilio
│  └─ 4-fullsnake.js   - Full implementation with streaming commentary
├─ package.json
├─ .env
└─ README.md

Features

Demo 4 (Full Snake) includes:

• Voice-controlled strategy: Say "go towards where the sun sets" and the LLM interprets it
• Voice-controlled colors: Say "Color blue" to change your snake's color
• Streaming commentary: AI-generated sports commentary streamed in real-time after each game
• Educational logging: Clean emoji-based logs showing what's happening

Model Used

• qwen2.5:1.5b: Handles all tasks - movement strategy, color conversion, and sports commentary generation