emarosa - how to use node.js to scrape the web lyrics
how to use node.js to scr+pe the web
we’ll learn how to use node.js and its packages to perform fast and efficient web scr+ping for single+page applications in this article. this can assist us in gathering and using useful data that isn’t always accessible through apis. let’s get started
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what is the concept of web scr+ping?
web scr+ping is a scripting method for extracting data from websites. web scr+ping is a method of automating the time+consuming task of copying data from multiple websites
where the desired websites do not expose an api for retrieving data, web scr+ping is commonly used. scr+ping emails from different websites for sales leads is one of the most popular web scr+ping scenarios
news headlines are scr+ped from news websites
product data were scr+ped from e+commerce websites
why do we need web scr+ping when e+commerce sites have apis (product advertising apis) for retrieving/collecting product information?
since e+commerce websites only reveal a portion of their product data through apis, web scr+ping is the most efficient way to collect as much data as possible
web scr+ping is often used by product comparison sites. crawling and scr+ping are used by google search engine to index search results
what exactly would we require?
it’s simple to get started with web scr+ping, and it’s broken down into two pieces
+ obtaining data through an http request
by parsing the html dom, essential data can be extracted
for web scr+ping, we’ll use node.js.our web scr+ping services provides high+quality structured data to improve business outcomes and enable intelligent decision making,our web scr+ping service allows you to scr+pe data from any websites and transfer web pages into an easy+to+use format such as excel, csv, json and many others.if you’re new to node, start with this article: “the only nodejs introduction you’ll ever need.”
we’ll also use two open+source npm modules: axios, which is a promise+based http client for the browser and node.js, and cheerio, which is a jquery for node.js. cheerio makes selecting, editing, and viewing dom elements easy
more information on comparing common http request libraries can be found here
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organize
our configuration is very straightforward. to create a package.json file, we create a new folder and run this command within it. let’s make our food delicious by following the recipe
init +y npm
let’s gather the ingredients for our recipe before we start cooking. add npm’s axios and cheerio as dependencies
cheerio cheerio cheerio cheerio cheerio cheerio cheerio cheerio cheerio cheeri
now we need to include them in our index.js file
require(‘axios’); require(‘cheerio’); const axios = require(‘axios’);
submit the request
now that we’ve gathered all of the ingredients for our meal, it’s time to get cooking. we’re scr+ping data from the hackernews website, which necessitates an http request to obtain the material. this is where axios comes into play
we get similar html content when we use chrome or any other browser to make a request. to scan through the html of a web page and select the necessary data, we’ll need to use chrome developer tools. more information on the chrome devtools can be found here
we’d like to scr+pe the news heading and the ties that go with it. by right+cl!cking somewhere on the website and choosing “inspect,” you will see the html code
to inspect the html, use chrome devtools
cheerio.js for html parsing
we use selectors to select tags of an html document in cheerio, the jquery for node.js. jquery was used to build the selector syntax. we need to find a selector for news headlines and its connection using chrome devtools. let’s season our food with some spices
we now have an array of javascript objects containing the title and links to the hackernews news stories. we can scr+pe data from a large number of websites in this way. so, our food has been cooked and appears to be delicious
final thoughts
we learned what web scr+ping is and how to use it to automate various data collection operations from various websites in this post
many websites use the single page application (spa) architecture to dynamically produce content using javascript. we can get the response from the initial http request, but we can’t use axios or other related npm packages like request to make dynamic content with javascript. as a result, we are limited to scr+ping data from static websites
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