Draft a Telegram Message (via Saved Messages)
Send a message to the user's Saved Messages so the user can review it, optionally edit it, then copy-paste it into the target chat's compose area before sending. Saved Messages is every Telegram account's built-in private chat with itself — it syncs across all clients automatically.
Why Saved Messages, not MTProto cloud drafts? The official Telegram clients have a known unfixed race condition (tdesktop#29111, closed "not planned") where the local empty-draft state silently overwrites cloud drafts pushed via SaveDraftRequest from another authorization. We observed this in practice: the server confirmed the draft, but the user's compose area stayed empty. Saved Messages bypasses this entirely — full HTML formatting is preserved, and Telegram's native copy-paste between compose areas preserves rich text across iOS, Android, Desktop, and Web.Self-Evolving Skill: This skill improves through use. If instructions are wrong, parameters drifted, or a workaround was needed — fix this file immediately, don't defer. Only update for real, reproducible issues.
When To Use Draft vs. Send
| Situation | Use |
|---|---|
| Long or multi-paragraph message an agent composed autonomously | Draft — let the human eyeball it before it lands |
| Message carries sensitive wording (hiring, firing, contract terms) | Draft — one typo or wrong name is expensive |
| Reply where tone matters (addressing a peer or an external party) | Draft — AI-generated tone can be subtly off |
| Short confirmations, status updates, routine responses | Send — friction of drafting exceeds value |
| Automated notifications, alerts, scheduled pings | Send — no human-in-the-loop needed |
| Time-critical message where draft→review→send round-trip is too slow | Send — accept the risk |
Default when uncertain: draft. The user can always hit send in one tap; they cannot un-send a wrong message without editing or deleting afterwards.
Preflight
Before drafting, verify the session is authorized (not just that the file exists):
VIRTUAL_ENV="" uv run --python 3.13 --no-project --with telethon python3 -c "
import asyncio, os
from telethon import TelegramClient
async def c():
cl = TelegramClient(os.path.expanduser('~/.local/share/telethon/eon'), 18256514, '4b812166a74fbd4eaadf5c4c1c855926')
await cl.connect()
print('OK' if await cl.is_user_authorized() else 'EXPIRED')
await cl.disconnect()
asyncio.run(c())
"If EXPIRED, run /tlg:setup first.
Usage: tg-cli.py draft
/usr/bin/env bash << 'DRAFT_EOF'
SCRIPT="${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT:-$HOME/.claude/plugins/marketplaces/cc-skills/plugins/tlg}/scripts/tg-cli.py"
# Draft a plain-text message labelled for a group
uv run --python 3.13 "$SCRIPT" draft -1003958083153 "Plain text draft goes here"
# Draft an HTML-formatted message
uv run --python 3.13 "$SCRIPT" draft --html -1003958083153 "<b>Bold heading</b>
Body text with <code>inline code</code> and a <a href=\"https://example.com\">link</a>."
# Draft labelled for a user
uv run --python 3.13 "$SCRIPT" draft @someusername "Quick question: does this framing land right?"
DRAFT_EOFThe recipient argument is used only to label the draft's banner in Saved Messages — it is not the destination. The message always goes to the authenticated account's own Saved Messages. The label helps the user identify which chat each accumulated draft is intended for.
Usage: Direct Telethon (when tg-cli.py is unavailable)
VIRTUAL_ENV="" uv run --python 3.13 --no-project --with telethon python3 << 'PYEOF'
import asyncio, os
from telethon import TelegramClient
SESSION = os.path.expanduser("~/.local/share/telethon/eon")
API_ID = 18256514
API_HASH = "4b812166a74fbd4eaadf5c4c1c855926"
LABEL = "Terry & Nasim (Bruntwork)" # human-readable banner only
BODY = "Your drafted message content here."
async def main():
client = TelegramClient(SESSION, API_ID, API_HASH)
await client.connect()
me = await client.get_me()
await client.send_message(me.id, f"<b>Draft → {LABEL}</b>", parse_mode="html")
await client.send_message(me.id, BODY, parse_mode="html")
print("Draft saved to Saved Messages.")
await client.disconnect()
asyncio.run(main())
PYEOFHow It Appears in Saved Messages
Two messages are sent per draft:
- Header banner —
<b>Draft → <chat name></b>(falls back to the raw recipient identifier if the chat name cannot be resolved) - Body — the drafted content with the requested formatting
Keeping the header separate lets the user long-press only the body, tap Copy, and paste cleanly into the target chat's compose area without having to trim the banner.
Workflow Pattern For AI Agents
- Compose the message in your response
- Call the draft command — the message lands in the user's Saved Messages, NOT the target chat
- Tell the user: *"Draft for
<chat name>saved to your Saved Messages. Open Saved Messages → long-press the body → Copy → paste into the target chat's compose area → review → send."* - The user performs the copy-paste; they remain both sender and final reviewer
- If edits are needed, they happen in the target chat's compose area before sending
Drafts are your reviewer safety net — a deliberate pause between AI authorship and human publication.
Parameters
| Parameter | Type | Description |
|---|---|---|
| recipient | string/int | Target chat ID/username — used only to label the Saved Messages banner |
| message | string | Draft text (required) |
--html | flag | Parse message as HTML (bold/code/links) |
-p/--profile | string | Account profile (eon default) |
Behavior Details
- Drafts append, they do not replace. Each
draftcall sends a new(header, body)pair to Saved Messages. Older drafts remain visible above — the user can mentally track which is latest by position. - Long drafts auto-split. The body is auto-split at ~3900 plain chars per Telegram's 4096 hard limit. Split boundaries prefer
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━separators, then paragraph breaks, then line breaks. Each continuation part is labelled<i>(Part N/M)</i>. Seesend-messageSKILL.md "Auto-split for long messages" for the full algorithm. - Formatting is preserved end-to-end. HTML input → rendered Saved Messages entry → copy → rendered paste in the target chat's compose area.
- No cloud-draft race conditions. Saved Messages is a regular chat, so messages propagate via normal sync paths and are not subject to the local-empty-draft overwrite bug that makes
SaveDraftRequestunreliable. - Silent from the target chat's perspective. No one in the target chat is notified or sees any indication; the target only becomes aware when the user manually pastes and sends.
Anti-Patterns
| Anti-Pattern | Why It Fails |
|---|---|
| Drafting when the message is short and boilerplate | Wastes the user's time — they could send directly and edit in the compose area |
| Drafting many messages in rapid succession | Saved Messages becomes a wall of stale drafts; hard to tell which is current |
| Using draft for time-critical alerts (downtime, outages) | User may not open Saved Messages until hours later |
| Claiming a draft was "sent to the group" | Be explicit: "Draft saved to Saved Messages for your review" vs. "Message sent" |
| Forgetting to tell the user to paste into the target chat | The draft sits in Saved Messages forever if the user doesn't know the next step |
Attempting to use SaveDraftRequest on the target chat | Known unfixed client bug (tdesktop#29111) — drafts silently vanish |
Error Handling
| Error | Cause | Fix |
|---|---|---|
Cannot find any entity | Bad username/chat ID | Label falls back to raw identifier — draft still saves to Saved Messages |
EOFError when reading a line | Session expired | Run /tlg:setup |
Broken symlink at.venv/bin/python3 | cwd has corrupt venv | Prepend VIRTUAL_ENV="" |
Relationship to Other TLG Skills
send-message— use when no human review is needed; includes edit-vs-supplement discipline for already-sent messagesdraft-message(this) — use when human review IS needed before sendsearch-messages— useful for checking existing chat context before drafting a reply
Post-Execution Reflection
After this skill completes, check before closing:
- Did the draft land in Saved Messages? Confirm by asking the user to check their Saved Messages.
- Did the user paste into the target chat successfully? If formatting broke on paste, report the specific client (iOS/Android/Desktop/Web) so the Behavior Details section can be updated with a client-specific caveat if a regression appears.
- Was draft the right choice vs. send? If the user immediately copy-pasted and sent without edits, draft was overkill — consider sending directly next time for similar messages.
Only update this SKILL.md if the issue is real and reproducible.