Can I pass html from a www into a csv file for review?

[Thyezer]

I am wanting to know how I can have an application look up information on a specific web site or sites, and save that information automatically into a .csv file for further analyzing?

Basically, I want to have an application look up my current vendor's price lists on the internet and creat a master list from all the vendors in a .csv file.

Is this possible?


Thanks!!!!

 

[BillyRayPreachersSon]

Thyezer,

I've never tried it, but theoretically you could do it client-side in IE only by:

1. Parsing the DOM of the page, recursing through to gleaning the text/prices/etc, then
2. Instantiating a client-side Excel.Application ActiveX object to create a new worksheet, paste your data in, and then call the save method.

I'm not sure if the ActiveX object can save as CSV files, but certainly XLS files.

You may want to look at the legal ramifications of doing this, however... So called deep-linking, scraping, or howveer you wnat to dress it up, is not a technique favoured by most site owners, and some of them have recently tended to take legal action against those undertaking the practice.

You may be better off asking them for a weekly/monthly price list in CSV format, and letting them do the work.

Hope this helps!

Dan