Webbots, Spiders, and Screen Scrapers

Using LIB_parse

The parsing library used in this book, LIB_parse, provides easy-to-read parsing functions that should meet most parsing tasks your webbots will encounter. Primarily, LIB_parse contains wrapper functions that provide simple interfaces to otherwise complicated routines. To use the examples in this book, you should download the latest version of this library from the book's website.

One of the things you may notice about LIB_parse is the lack of regular expressions. Although regular expressions are the mainstay for parsing text, you won't find many of them here. Regular expressions can be difficult to read and understand, especially for beginners. The built-in PHP string manipulation functions are easier to understand and usually more ...