Hey, let's work through the problems you're hitting with the Java Telegram Bot API. Since you already confirmed the web API works, we can narrow down the root causes pretty quickly. Here's what to check step by step:

First, Capture Exact Error Details #

The biggest mistake here is not checking the actual error responses from Telegram. Both getUpdates and sendMessage return detailed error info that will tell you exactly what's wrong. Add these checks to your code immediately:

For getUpdates: #

GetUpdatesResponse gur = bot.execute(getUpdates);
System.out.println("getUpdates succeeded? " + gur.isOk());
if (!gur.isOk()) {
    System.out.println("Error Code: " + gur.errorCode());
    System.out.println("Error Message: " + gur.description());
}

For sendMessage: #

SendResponse sendResponse = bot.execute(request);
System.out.println("sendMessage succeeded? " + sendResponse.isOk());
if (!sendResponse.isOk()) {
    System.out.println("Error Code: " + sendResponse.errorCode());
    System.out.println("Error Message: " + sendResponse.description());
}

This will give you direct feedback from Telegram—like invalid permissions, a bad chat ID, or malformed parameters—instead of guessing.

Fixing getUpdates Returning No Updates #

If your list is empty (or gur.updates() is null), here are the most likely fixes:

• Your offset is stuck on 0: Telegram doesn't resend updates you've already fetched (even via the web API). If you previously pulled updates through another tool, offset(0) won't return anything. Try setting offset(-1) to fetch the latest single update, or track the highest update_id from previous responses and use update_id + 1 as your next offset.
• Timeout set to 0: timeout(0) makes the request return immediately, even if there are no new updates. Change it to timeout(30) (30-second long polling) so the request waits for new messages to come in.
• No new activity: Make sure you're sending new messages in the group (tag the bot or just send regular messages) while testing—if there's nothing new, getUpdates will naturally return an empty list.

Fixing sendMessage Returning False #

Since the web API works, the issue is likely in your Java request parameters:

• Incorrect chat ID: Group chat IDs are negative numbers (e.g., -123456789). Double-check that you're passing the numeric ID, not the group's username (like @mygroup—while sometimes allowed, numeric IDs are more reliable).
• Invalid replyToMessageId: You're setting replyToMessageId(1)—if there's no message with ID 1 in your group, this will fail. Remove this parameter entirely for your first test to rule it out.
• Bad HTML formatting: If your text has unclosed HTML tags or invalid markup, ParseMode.HTML will cause the request to fail. Test with plain text first (remove the parseMode line) to confirm, then fix your HTML.
• Restricted bot permissions: Even if the bot is an admin, double-check group settings to ensure it has permission to send messages, send media, etc. Sometimes admin roles have limited permissions by default.

Quick Test to Isolate Issues #

Strip down your sendMessage code to the absolute minimum to confirm basic functionality works:

// Simplified test for sendMessage
SendMessage testRequest = new SendMessage(yourChatId, "Test message from Java API");
SendResponse testResponse = bot.execute(testRequest);
System.out.println("Test send succeeded? " + testResponse.isOk());
if (!testResponse.isOk()) {
    System.out.println("Test error: " + testResponse.description());
}

If this works, add back your parameters one by one (parseMode, disableWebPagePreview, etc.) to find which one is causing the failure.

内容的提问来源于stack exchange，提问作者srikanth