Automated DNS Update Solution Needed

bdgenz has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

Here's what I've got...
A web based only DNS update tool at the service provider.

The Solution so far...

use strict;
use LWP;
use LWP::Simple;
use HTTP::Request::Common;
use HTTP::Cookies;
use HTML::Form;
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I grab the login page, set the cookie.
Pop in the username and pw, update the cookie.
Grab the DNS update page with all the DNS entries
Dump the hash using dumpvar.pl - too much extra stuff tho, looks tough to parse.

What I think I'd like to do...

Dump the contents of just the one text area w/names/ips to a local file. This is where I'm needing help right now.
Append the dumped DNS file w/a local file w/new sub domains.
Read the contents of the updated dumped DNS file and pass it back to the web form.

Any ideas?
I can post the script if needed.

TIA
BDGenZ

Edit by BazB: add formatting/code tags.

Comment on Automated DNS Update Solution Needed Download Code

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Re: Automated DNS Update Solution Needed
by Joost (Canon) on Dec 20, 2004 at 20:57 UTC

Wow. That's a big paragraph, and I've only got a slight clue what you're actually asking.
Nevertheless, you can probably remove all references to LWP, HTTP::Request, HTTP::Cookies and HTML::Form from your code and replace them with WWW::Mechanize, which should give you a much cleaner interface to the web-based tool.
~~As for the rest of your question: what is your question? :-)~~
Updated because reformatting made the question slightly clearer
I stand by my recommendation of WWW::Mechanize, as it wil almost certainly make your code a lot simpler. The only thing it doesn't do (as far as I know) is give you the value of a filled in textarea field. HTML::Form should be able to do that for you:
$form = HTML::Form->parse($html, $base_uri); $value = $form->value( $name );
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You can then parse $value and use the set_field() method of WWW::Mechanize to set the field value to the new value.
If you want more information, you're going to have to go into more detail: what's the code of your script, what's the code of the html page you want to parse. and what do you want to submit back to the router.
Most of us regular monks are glad to help, but we can't read your mind :-)

"What should it profit a man, if he should win a flame war, yet lose his cool?"

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Re^2: Automated DNS Update Solution Needed

by PodMaster (Abbot) on Dec 21, 2004 at 10:55 UTC

The only thing it doesn't do (as far as I know) is give you the value of a filled in textarea field.

q=test

C:\> perl -MWWW::Mechanize::Shell -e shell Module File::Modified not found. Automatic reloading disabled. >get http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&num=100&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=test&btnG=Google+Search Retrieving http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&num=100&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=test&btnG=Google+Search(200) http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&num=100&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=test&btnG=Google+Search> http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&num=100&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=test&btnG=Google+Search>forms Form [1] GET http://www.google.com/search [gs] num=100 (hidden readonly) hl=en (hidden readonly) lr= (hidden readonly) q=test (text) btnG=Search (submit) Form [2] GET http://www.google.com/search q=test (text) btnG=Search (submit) num=100 (hidden readonly) hl=en (hidden readonly) lr= (hidden readonly) http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&num=100&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=test&btnG=Google+Search>

MJD says "you can't just make shit up and expect the computer to know what you mean, retardo!"
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Re^3: Automated DNS Update Solution Needed

by Hero Zzyzzx (Curate) on Dec 21, 2004 at 20:26 UTC

That's an <input type="text" name="q">, not a <textarea name="q"></textarea>, on googles homepage, right?

-Any sufficiently advanced technology is
indistinguishable from doubletalk.

My Biz

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Re^4: Automated DNS Update Solution Needed

by PodMaster (Abbot) on Dec 22, 2004 at 07:19 UTC

Re^2: Automated DNS Update Solution Needed

by bdgenz (Initiate) on Dec 23, 2004 at 10:58 UTC

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Re: Automated DNS Update Solution Needed
by Anonymous Monk on Dec 23, 2004 at 10:50 UTC

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