-----Original Message-----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On
Behalf Of Ed Leafe
Sent: Thursday, July 27, 2006 10:15
To: ProFox Email List
Subject: Re: Screen scraping from VFP
On Jul 27, 2006, at 9:54 AM, Hal Kaplan wrote:
> Everyone, to me this sounds like making a web service where one does
> not exist. Would that be an accurate statement?
Not really. It's using information from websites, but a web
service implies an interface: you request a certain piece of information
in an agreed-upon way, and that info is returned to you in an agreed-
upon way.
With screen-scraping, you're taking their normal web page and
parsing it to get the info you want. If they change their format it can
completely screw up the screen-scraping process, and since they have no
agreement with you to maintain a format, it is certainly common for this
to happen.
-- Ed Leafe
========================================================================
=
That's exactly what I meant, Ed. By screen scraping you are attempting
to achieve the benefit of what a web service could provide when, in
fact, there is no web service supplied by the site you are scraping.
I think you and I are having a disconnect because you are an up-stater
and I am a down-stater. You probably voted for George
Pata-catastrophe-ki <g>.
HALinNY
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