I don't disagree that you need to know the HTML before you start. It was more about creating a scraper object, not using procedural code, in which the part that "knows the HTML" is a neat sub-section, using a regex or instructions for a parser.

So rather than have script A which says 

# ... having got to a certain page
$mech->content() =~ m/LONGFIDDLYCAPTURINGREGEXHERE/;
my $place_where_the_links_are = $1;
# get the links from that place and continue

[download]
and another script B which does the same, and another script C with yet another, and so on, at least I could push the complexity down into a module, object etc and not have to see it, and not have to write multiple scripts for multiple publications.

And the moment the NYT changes their HTML, someone could figure out the new regex and update Scraper::Newspapers::NYT or whatever it would be.


($_='kkvvttuu bbooppuuiiffss qqffssmm iibbddllffss')
=~y~b-v~a-z~s; print

In reply to Re^2: How To Write A Scraper? by Cody Pendant
in thread How To Write A Scraper? by Cody Pendant

Title:
Use:  <p> text here (a paragraph) </p>
and:  <code> code here </code>
to format your post, it's "PerlMonks-approved HTML":


  • Posts are HTML formatted. Put <p> </p> tags around your paragraphs. Put <code> </code> tags around your code and data!
  • Titles consisting of a single word are discouraged, and in most cases are disallowed outright.
  • Read Where should I post X? if you're not absolutely sure you're posting in the right place.
  • Please read these before you post! —
  • Posts may use any of the Perl Monks Approved HTML tags:
    a, abbr, b, big, blockquote, br, caption, center, col, colgroup, dd, del, details, div, dl, dt, em, font, h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6, hr, i, ins, li, ol, p, pre, readmore, small, span, spoiler, strike, strong, sub, summary, sup, table, tbody, td, tfoot, th, thead, tr, tt, u, ul, wbr
  • You may need to use entities for some characters, as follows. (Exception: Within code tags, you can put the characters literally.)
            For:     Use:
    & &amp;
    < &lt;
    > &gt;
    [ &#91;
    ] &#93;
  • Link using PerlMonks shortcuts! What shortcuts can I use for linking?
  • See Writeup Formatting Tips and other pages linked from there for more info.