Automatic TV listings: Was RE: http://zz9.dnsq.org

[Colin Bradford <colin@xxxxxxx>]

On Fri, 25 Jan 2002, Keith Doxey wrote:
> I was working on a similar idea last year and had just about perfected
the
> script that would process the HTML grabbed from Ananova when the
b*******
> redisigned the site and TOTALLY stuffed my script.
>
> I havent had time to play with the idea anymore but I remember at the
time
> having concerns about the server logs picking up on
"automated" hits to grab
> pages.
>
> If only there was a legitimate way to get this info.

I've been pondering this as well. I've got a version that screenscrapes
>from
logs...

> Your idea of an XML format could be one way to go, but wouldnt a
simple CSV
> file in an agreed format take up much less bandwidth. It would also
mean
> that people could import it directly into Access, SQL, MySQL, Excel
etc
> without having to do any processing.
>
> Once they had it in a database they can search and retrieve the data
anyway
> they like.

I'm wondering about approaching Digiguide, and asking if they'd add an
XML version of their database for subscribers. I much prefer XML over
CSV because if the format changes then you don't need to rewrite the
code that uploads it into the database - also, you don't have problems
with whether text strings are enclosed in quotes or not, text strings
including new lines etc.

I suspect that Digiguide would want to know how many people would
subscribe before they committed to doing anything. So, what are the
groups views on this?

Cheers,

Colin.