diff --git a/zulip_botserver/README.md b/zulip_botserver/README.md
index 5efbbeaf..c16e0b1e 100644
--- a/zulip_botserver/README.md
+++ b/zulip_botserver/README.md
@@ -1,16 +1,29 @@
 ```
 zulip-botserver --config-file <path to botserverrc> --hostname <address> --port <port>
-
 ```
 
 Example: `zulip-botserver --config-file ~/botserverrc`
 
 This program loads the bot configurations from the
-config file (botserverrc here) and loads the bot modules.
+config file (`botserverrc`, here) and loads the bot modules.
 It then starts the server and fetches the requests to the
 above loaded modules and returns the success/failure result.
 
-Please make sure you have a current botserverrc file with the
-configurations of the required bots.
-Hostname and Port are optional arguments. Default hostname is
-127.0.0.1 and default port is 5002.
+The `--hostname` and `--port` arguments are optional, and default to
+127.0.0.1 and 5002 respectively.
+
+The format for a configuration file is:
+
+    [helloworld]
+    key=value
+    email=helloworld-bot@zulip.com
+    site=http://localhost
+    token=abcd1234
+
+Is passed `--use-env-vars` instead of `--config-file`, the
+configuration can instead be provided via the `ZULIP_BOTSERVER_CONFIG`
+environment variable.  This should be a JSON-formatted dictionary of
+bot names to dictionary of their configuration; for example:
+
+    ZULIP_BOTSERVER_CONFIG='{"helloworld":{"email":"helloworld-bot@zulip.com","key":"value","site":"http://localhost","token":"abcd1234"}}' \
+      zulip-botserver --use-env-vars
diff --git a/zulip_botserver/zulip_botserver/input_parameters.py b/zulip_botserver/zulip_botserver/input_parameters.py
index 2d6a2fe0..1b7d585a 100644
--- a/zulip_botserver/zulip_botserver/input_parameters.py
+++ b/zulip_botserver/zulip_botserver/input_parameters.py
@@ -7,13 +7,19 @@ def parse_args() -> argparse.Namespace:
     '''
 
     parser = argparse.ArgumentParser(usage=usage)
-    parser.add_argument(
+    mutually_exclusive_args = parser.add_mutually_exclusive_group(required=True)
+    # config-file or use-env-vars made mutually exclusive to prevent conflicts
+    mutually_exclusive_args.add_argument(
         '--config-file', '-c',
         action='store',
-        required=True,
         help='Config file for the Botserver. Use your `botserverrc` for multiple bots or'
              '`zuliprc` for a single bot.'
     )
+    mutually_exclusive_args.add_argument(
+        '--use-env-vars', '-e',
+        action='store_true',
+        help='Load configuration from JSON in ZULIP_BOTSERVER_CONFIG environment variable.'
+    )
     parser.add_argument(
         '--bot-config-file',
         action='store',
diff --git a/zulip_botserver/zulip_botserver/server.py b/zulip_botserver/zulip_botserver/server.py
index 6ad67629..ed5a048e 100644
--- a/zulip_botserver/zulip_botserver/server.py
+++ b/zulip_botserver/zulip_botserver/server.py
@@ -7,6 +7,7 @@ import os
 import sys
 import importlib.util
 
+from collections import OrderedDict
 from configparser import MissingSectionHeaderError, NoOptionError
 from flask import Flask, request
 from importlib import import_module
@@ -28,6 +29,32 @@ def read_config_section(parser: configparser.ConfigParser, section: str) -> Dict
     }
     return section_info
 
+def read_config_from_env_vars(bot_name: Optional[str] = None) -> Dict[str, Dict[str, str]]:
+    bots_config = {}  # type: Dict[str, Dict[str, str]]
+    json_config = os.environ.get('ZULIP_BOTSERVER_CONFIG')
+
+    if json_config is None:
+        raise OSError("Could not read environment variable 'ZULIP_BOTSERVER_CONFIG': Variable not set.")
+
+    # Load JSON-formatted environment variable; use OrderedDict to
+    # preserve ordering on Python 3.6 and below.
+    env_config = json.loads(json_config, object_pairs_hook=OrderedDict)
+    if bot_name is not None:
+        if bot_name in env_config:
+            bots_config[bot_name] = env_config[bot_name]
+        else:
+            # If the bot name provided via the command line does not
+            # exist in the configuration provided via the environment
+            # variable, use the first bot in the environment variable,
+            # with name updated to match, along with a warning.
+            first_bot_name = list(env_config.keys())[0]
+            bots_config[bot_name] = env_config[first_bot_name]
+            logging.warning(
+                "First bot name in the config list was changed from '{}' to '{}'".format(first_bot_name, bot_name)
+            )
+    else:
+        bots_config = dict(env_config)
+    return bots_config
 
 def read_config_file(config_file_path: str, bot_name: Optional[str] = None) -> Dict[str, Dict[str, str]]:
     parser = parse_config_file(config_file_path)
@@ -178,16 +205,20 @@ def handle_bot() -> str:
 def main() -> None:
     options = parse_args()
     global bots_config
-    try:
-        bots_config = read_config_file(options.config_file, options.bot_name)
-    except MissingSectionHeaderError:
-        sys.exit("Error: Your Botserver config file `{0}` contains an empty section header!\n"
-                 "You need to write the names of the bots you want to run in the "
-                 "section headers of `{0}`.".format(options.config_file))
-    except NoOptionError as e:
-        sys.exit("Error: Your Botserver config file `{0}` has a missing option `{1}` in section `{2}`!\n"
-                 "You need to add option `{1}` with appropriate value in section `{2}` of `{0}`"
-                 .format(options.config_file, e.option, e.section))
+
+    if options.use_env_vars:
+        bots_config = read_config_from_env_vars(options.bot_name)
+    elif options.config_file:
+        try:
+            bots_config = read_config_file(options.config_file, options.bot_name)
+        except MissingSectionHeaderError:
+            sys.exit("Error: Your Botserver config file `{0}` contains an empty section header!\n"
+                     "You need to write the names of the bots you want to run in the "
+                     "section headers of `{0}`.".format(options.config_file))
+        except NoOptionError as e:
+            sys.exit("Error: Your Botserver config file `{0}` has a missing option `{1}` in section `{2}`!\n"
+                     "You need to add option `{1}` with appropriate value in section `{2}` of `{0}`"
+                     .format(options.config_file, e.option, e.section))
 
     available_bots = list(bots_config.keys())
     bots_lib_modules = load_lib_modules(available_bots)

diff --git a/zulip_botserver/tests/test_server.py b/zulip_botserver/tests/test_server.py
index d38cd93e..653ef4b9 100644
--- a/zulip_botserver/tests/test_server.py
+++ b/zulip_botserver/tests/test_server.py
@@ -4,6 +4,7 @@ from typing import Any, Dict
 import unittest
 from .server_test_lib import BotServerTestCase
 import json
+from collections import OrderedDict
 from importlib import import_module
 from types import ModuleType
 
@@ -132,6 +133,34 @@ class BotServerTests(BotServerTestCase):
         assert opts.hostname == '127.0.0.1'
         assert opts.port == 5002
 
+    def test_read_config_from_env_vars(self) -> None:
+        # We use an OrderedDict so that the order of the entries in
+        # the stringified environment variable is standard even on
+        # Python 3.7 and earlier.
+        bots_config = OrderedDict()
+        bots_config['hello_world'] = {
+            'email': 'helloworld-bot@zulip.com',
+            'key': 'value',
+            'site': 'http://localhost',
+            'token': 'abcd1234',
+        }
+        bots_config['giphy'] = {
+            'email': 'giphy-bot@zulip.com',
+            'key': 'value2',
+            'site': 'http://localhost',
+            'token': 'abcd1234',
+        }
+        os.environ['ZULIP_BOTSERVER_CONFIG'] = json.dumps(bots_config)
+
+        # No bot specified; should read all bot configs
+        assert server.read_config_from_env_vars() == bots_config
+
+        # Specified bot exists; should read only that section.
+        assert server.read_config_from_env_vars("giphy") == {'giphy': bots_config['giphy']}
+
+        # Specified bot doesn't exist; should read the first section of the config.
+        assert server.read_config_from_env_vars("redefined_bot") == {'redefined_bot': bots_config['hello_world']}
+
     def test_read_config_file(self) -> None:
         with self.assertRaises(IOError):
             server.read_config_file("nonexistentfile.conf")

Allow passing config via environment variables to zulip-botserver
**Component:** `zulip-botserver`
**Package:** https://pypi.org/project/zulip-botserver/
**Code:** https://github.com/zulip/python-zulip-api/tree/master/zulip_botserver

Instead of requiring that config be passed as a file with the `--config-file` option, it would be great if we could pass config via environment variables.
This would make our secure key storage system much easier, as right now we use env variables to pass down secure keys to containers, and creating a config file to store them on disk is suboptimal.

```ini
[helloworld]
email=foo-bot@hostname
key=dOHHlyqgpt5g0tVuVl6NHxDLlc9eFRX4
site=http://hostname
token=aQVQmSd6j6IHphJ9m1jhgHdbnhl5ZcsY
```

Becomes:

```bash
env BOT_EMAIL=foo-bot@hostname BOT_KEY=abc... BOT_SITE=https://hostname BOT_TOKEN=abc... zulip-botserver
```

I would require adding ~20 LOC to https://github.com/zulip/python-zulip-api/blob/master/zulip_botserver/zulip_botserver/server.py, if this proposal sounds reasonable, I can probably submit a PR for it myself without too much difficulty.
zulip_botserver/tests/test_server.py::BotServerTests::test_read_config_from_env_vars
zulip_botserver/tests/test_server.py::BotServerTests::test_argument_parsing_defaults zulip_botserver/tests/test_server.py::BotServerTests::test_load_lib_modules zulip_botserver/tests/test_server.py::BotServerTests::test_read_config_file zulip_botserver/tests/test_server.py::BotServerTests::test_request_for_unkown_bot zulip_botserver/tests/test_server.py::BotServerTests::test_successful_request zulip_botserver/tests/test_server.py::BotServerTests::test_successful_request_from_two_bots zulip_botserver/tests/test_server.py::BotServerTests::test_wrong_bot_credentials zulip_botserver/tests/test_server.py::BotServerTests::test_wrong_bot_token