Web data scraping

Brief theory about process and goals

Web data scraping is a software technique of extracting information from websites.
This terms are more or less equivalent: web data harvesting, extraction, fetching..
Usually, such software programs simulate human exploration of the Web by either implementing low-level Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP), or embedding certain full-fledged Web browsers, such as the Internet Explorer (IE) and the Mozilla Web browser.
Web data scraping is closely related to Web indexing, which indexes Web content using a bot and is a universal technique adopted by most search engines. In contrast, Web data scraping focuses more on the transformation of unstructured Web content, typically in HTML format, into structured data that can be stored and analyzed in a central local database or spreadsheet.
Web data scraping is also related to Web automation, which simulates human Web browsing using computer software.
Exemplary uses of Web data fetch include online price comparison, weather data monitoring, website change detection, Web research, Web content mashup and Web data integration.

GP-WEB data scraping solutions