Ebook: Webbots, spiders, and screen scrapers: a guide to developing Internet agents with PHP/CURL

Part I. Fundamental Concepts and Techniques -- What's in It for You? -- Ideas for Webbot Projects -- Downloading Web Pages -- Parsing Techniques -- Automating Form Submission -- Managing Large Amounts of Data -- Part II. Projects -- Price-Monitoring Webbots -- Image-Capturing Webbots -- Link-Verification Webbots -- Anonymous Browsing Webbots -- Search-Ranking Webbots -- Aggregation Webbots -- FTP Webbots -- NNTP News Webbots -- Webbots That Read Email -- Webbots that Send Email -- Converting a Website into a Function -- Part III. Advanced Technical considerations -- Spiders -- Procurement Webbots and Snipers -- Webbots and Cryptography -- Authentication -- Advanced Cookie Management -- Scheduling Webbots and Spiders -- Part IV. Larger Considerations -- Designing Stealthy Webbots and Spiders -- Writing Fault-Tolerant Webbots -- Killing Spiders -- Keeping Webbots Out of Trouble.;The Internet is bigger and better than what a mere browser allows. Webbots, Spiders, and Screen Scrapers is for programmers and businesspeople who want to take full advantage of the vast resources available on the Web. --from publisher description.