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help re recording/replaying (i.e. automating) HTTP interactions to a web-site???

Greg Hauptmann

4/26/2008 8:48:00 AM

Hi,

Actually can anyone recommend a good technique / software / plugin
that would assist if I wanted to effectively (a) record my interaction
with my bank at the HTTP level, then (b) use this to automate that
behavior in my RoR application to automate pulling down daily account
details?

The best I can think of at the moment is: (a) Firefox Live HTTP
Headers plugin then (b) manually write Ruby code that sends these out
and waits for the response & check it before proceeding to the next
http request. I'm thinking someone probably has a better way, or
plugin, to handle at least part (b)?

Tks
12 Answers

Peter Szinek

4/26/2008 9:11:00 AM

0

[Note: parts of this message were removed to make it a legal post.]

Greg,

Have you looked into (Fire)Watir?

I am just releasing a new version of scRUBYt! (a web scraping
framework) where it will be possible to use FireWatir as the agent for
navigation/scraping, so you can write a simple but powerful DSL (stuff
like 'click_link', 'fill_textfield' etc) which is executed through
Firefox and is very well suited for scenarios you just described. Drop
me a line if you are interested.

But of course plain (Fire)Watir would do, too.

Cheers,
Peter
___
http://www.rubyra...
http://s...

On Apr 26, 2008, at 10:47 AM, Greg Hauptmann wrote:

> Hi,
>
> Actually can anyone recommend a good technique / software / plugin
> that would assist if I wanted to effectively (a) record my interaction
> with my bank at the HTTP level, then (b) use this to automate that
> behavior in my RoR application to automate pulling down daily account
> details?
>
> The best I can think of at the moment is: (a) Firefox Live HTTP
> Headers plugin then (b) manually write Ruby code that sends these out
> and waits for the response & check it before proceeding to the next
> http request. I'm thinking someone probably has a better way, or
> plugin, to handle at least part (b)?
>
> Tks
>

Greg Hauptmann

4/26/2008 9:19:00 PM

0

sounds good, it support:
=95 https?
=95 cookies?
=95 building in some intelligence? (say when the link for step N will
change over time but you can write an algorithm for it)

thanks

On 4/26/08, Peter Szinek <peter@rubyrailways.com> wrote:
> Greg,
>
> Have you looked into (Fire)Watir?
>
> I am just releasing a new version of scRUBYt! (a web scraping
> framework) where it will be possible to use FireWatir as the agent for
> navigation/scraping, so you can write a simple but powerful DSL (stuff
> like 'click_link', 'fill_textfield' etc) which is executed through
> Firefox and is very well suited for scenarios you just described. Drop
> me a line if you are interested.
>
> But of course plain (Fire)Watir would do, too.
>
> Cheers,
> Peter
> ___
> http://www.rubyra...
> http://s...
>
> On Apr 26, 2008, at 10:47 AM, Greg Hauptmann wrote:
>
> > Hi,
> >
> > Actually can anyone recommend a good technique / software / plugin
> > that would assist if I wanted to effectively (a) record my interaction
> > with my bank at the HTTP level, then (b) use this to automate that
> > behavior in my RoR application to automate pulling down daily account
> > details?
> >
> > The best I can think of at the moment is: (a) Firefox Live HTTP
> > Headers plugin then (b) manually write Ruby code that sends these out
> > and waits for the response & check it before proceeding to the next
> > http request. I'm thinking someone probably has a better way, or
> > plugin, to handle at least part (b)?
> >
> > Tks
> >
>
>

Greg Hauptmann

4/26/2008 9:29:00 PM

0

PS. 4th question Peter I forgot:
=95 does it support downloading a file (eg csv file, account transactions)

On 4/27/08, Greg Hauptmann <greg.hauptmann.ruby@gmail.com> wrote:
> sounds good, it support:
> =95 https?
> =95 cookies?
> =95 building in some intelligence? (say when the link for step N will
> change over time but you can write an algorithm for it)
>
> thanks
>
> On 4/26/08, Peter Szinek <peter@rubyrailways.com> wrote:
> > Greg,
> >
> > Have you looked into (Fire)Watir?
> >
> > I am just releasing a new version of scRUBYt! (a web scraping
> > framework) where it will be possible to use FireWatir as the agent for
> > navigation/scraping, so you can write a simple but powerful DSL (stuff
> > like 'click_link', 'fill_textfield' etc) which is executed through
> > Firefox and is very well suited for scenarios you just described. Drop
> > me a line if you are interested.
> >
> > But of course plain (Fire)Watir would do, too.
> >
> > Cheers,
> > Peter
> > ___
> > http://www.rubyra...
> > http://s...
> >
> > On Apr 26, 2008, at 10:47 AM, Greg Hauptmann wrote:
> >
> > > Hi,
> > >
> > > Actually can anyone recommend a good technique / software / plugin
> > > that would assist if I wanted to effectively (a) record my interactio=
n
> > > with my bank at the HTTP level, then (b) use this to automate that
> > > behavior in my RoR application to automate pulling down daily account
> > > details?
> > >
> > > The best I can think of at the moment is: (a) Firefox Live HTTP
> > > Headers plugin then (b) manually write Ruby code that sends these out
> > > and waits for the response & check it before proceeding to the next
> > > http request. I'm thinking someone probably has a better way, or
> > > plugin, to handle at least part (b)?
> > >
> > > Tks
> > >
> >
> >
>

Phillip Gawlowski

4/26/2008 9:33:00 PM

0

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Hash: SHA1

Greg Hauptmann wrote:
| PS. 4th question Peter I forgot:
| ? does it support downloading a file (eg csv file, account transactions)

http://wtr.ruby...

Find it out?

- --
Phillip Gawlowski
Twitter: twitter.com/cynicalryan

A born loser:
~ Somebody who calls the number that's scrawled in lipstick on the phone
~ booth wall-- and his wife answers.
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Greg Hauptmann

4/27/2008 2:45:00 AM

0

I see Watar requircs/drives a browser...i'm after something browser
independent...any other library/plugin suggestions?

On 4/27/08, Phillip Gawlowski <cmdjackryan@googlemail.com> wrote:
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: SHA1
>
> Greg Hauptmann wrote:
> | PS. 4th question Peter I forgot:
> | =95 does it support downloading a file (eg csv file, account transactio=
ns)
>
> http://wtr.ruby...
>
> Find it out?
>
> - --
> Phillip Gawlowski
> Twitter: twitter.com/cynicalryan
>
> A born loser:
> ~ Somebody who calls the number that's scrawled in lipstick on the phone
> ~ booth wall-- and his wife answers.
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
> Version: GnuPG v1.4.8 (MingW32)
> Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail....
>
> iEYEARECAAYFAkgTn5wACgkQbtAgaoJTgL+jvgCePwARmYTIE1hktGz6yVD0JeWk
> rHMAnRt+JpgafQAJivHFyXvag8Tt2duT
> =3Dsmt6
> -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
>
>

Phillip Gawlowski

4/27/2008 3:21:00 AM

0

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

A: Because it makes it hard to follow the discussion.
Q: Why is top posting bad?

Greg Hauptmann wrote:
| I see Watar requircs/drives a browser...i'm after something browser
| independent...any other library/plugin suggestions?

WWW::Mechanize is quite popular, from what I've seen so far.
- --
Phillip Gawlowski
Twitter: twitter.com/cynicalryan

~ - You know you've been hacking too long when...
...you discover that you're balancing your checkbook in octal.
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=vQTZ
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

7stud --

4/27/2008 6:17:00 AM

0

Greg Hauptmann wrote:
> Hi,
>
> Actually can anyone recommend a good technique / software / plugin
> that would assist if I wanted to effectively (a) record my interaction
> with my bank at the HTTP level, then (b) use this to automate that
> behavior in my RoR application to automate pulling down daily account
> details?
>
> The best I can think of at the moment is: (a) Firefox Live HTTP
> Headers plugin then (b) manually write Ruby code that sends these out
> and waits for the response & check it before proceeding to the next
> http request. I'm thinking someone probably has a better way, or
> plugin, to handle at least part (b)?
>

I'm not sure what the Firefox Live HTTP headers plugin will do for you.
If you write a ruby program to send out requests to a url, then you know
what headers you are sending in your request, and when you get the
response, you can read the headers in the response.


--
Posted via http://www.ruby-....

Peter Szinek

4/28/2008 6:32:00 AM

0

> PS. 4th question Peter I forgot:
> =95 does it support downloading a file (eg csv file, account =20
> transactions)
>
> On 4/27/08, Greg Hauptmann <greg.hauptmann.ruby@gmail.com> wrote:
>> sounds good, it support:
>> =95 https?
>> =95 cookies?
>> =95 building in some intelligence? (say when the link for step N will
>> change over time but you can write an algorithm for it)
>>

Yes, scRUBYt! supports all these things... In the current =20
implementation WWW::Mechanize is used as the agent, but it doesn't =20
support JavaScript and (more often than not) e-banking sites have =20
some JS... so that's why I suggested the FireWatir based solution.

A browser-agnostic solution doesn't exist (Mechanize is a browser too) =20=

- the nature of the task requires a browser. Call it as you like, but =20=

if something is able to GET/POST requests, store cookies, use https, =20
sessions, .... then it is a browser in my vocabulary.

Besides FireWatir is platform-independent (unlike Watir which is win32 =20=

only).

Cheers,
Peter=

Greg Hauptmann

4/28/2008 10:51:00 AM

0

thanks Peter - I was starting to look at Mechanize but will focus in
at scRUBYt...
2008/4/28 Peter Szinek <peter@rubyrailways.com>:

> PS. 4th question Peter I forgot:
> > =95 does it support downloading a file (eg csv file, account transactio=
ns)
> >
> > On 4/27/08, Greg Hauptmann <greg.hauptmann.ruby@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > > sounds good, it support:
> > > =95 https?
> > > =95 cookies?
> > > =95 building in some intelligence? (say when the link for step N will
> > > change over time but you can write an algorithm for it)
> > >
> > >
> Yes, scRUBYt! supports all these things... In the current implementation
> WWW::Mechanize is used as the agent, but it doesn't support JavaScript an=
d
> (more often than not) e-banking sites have some JS... so that's why I
> suggested the FireWatir based solution.
>
> A browser-agnostic solution doesn't exist (Mechanize is a browser too) -
> the nature of the task requires a browser. Call it as you like, but if
> something is able to GET/POST requests, store cookies, use https, session=
s,
> .... then it is a browser in my vocabulary.
>
> Besides FireWatir is platform-independent (unlike Watir which is win32
> only).
>
> Cheers,
> Peter
>

Peter Szinek

4/28/2008 11:07:00 AM

0

[Note: parts of this message were removed to make it a legal post.]


On Apr 28, 2008, at 12:50 PM, Greg Hauptmann wrote:

> thanks Peter - I was starting to look at Mechanize but will focus in
> at scRUBYt...
> 2008/4/28 Peter Szinek <peter@rubyrailways.com>:

OK, cool. If you don't have JS/AJAX or other trick that Mechanize
can't handle, you should be OK.

On the other hand, if you do have JS/AJAX on the page, you will need
FireWatir, whether you like it or not :-) the FireWatir-enabled
version of scRUBYt! is not yet officially released - if you want to
try it, you need to d/l it from http://s.../scrubyt-...
and install.

Let me know if you encounter any problems!

Cheers,
Peter
___
http://www.rubyra...
http://s...