Data Science

A Guide to Web Scraping - (An example : Hindi News Website)

What is Web Scraping?

A method for gathering information and data from the internet is called web scraping (also known as data scraping). However, when individuals use the term "web scrapers," they often refer to computer programs. Web scraping software (also known as "bots") is designed to visit websites, grab the pertinent pages, and extract useful data.

Types of data that you can scrape from the web:

Any data available on an internet website may be scraped. Images, videos, text, product information, customer opinions and reviews, and price from comparison websites are just a few examples of the common data kinds that businesses gather. However, there are certain legal restrictions on the kinds of data you can scrape.

Using Selenium to scrape the web (step-by-step)

Selenium is a Python library and tool used to automate a variety of tasks in web browsers. Web scraping is one method for obtaining useful data and information that might not otherwise be available.

STEP 1.) Installing and importing the necessary libraries and module

STEP 2.) Access any Website using webdriver

Note: I am scraping TheQuint news website.

STEP 3.) Locate and look for those elements which you want to scrape

STEP 4.) Accessing href links on a particular web page

STEP 5.) Accessing headlines, date, time, and content

Conclusion:

This post has examined what data scraping is, the types of data that may be scraped, and the steps involved. Important lessons include:

Web scraping may be used to gather a variety of data kinds, including text, numbers, photos, videos, and more.
Do not violate the law: To avoid violating a website's terms of service, verify the legislation of different countries before scraping the web.

Selenium is a great tool for automating virtually anything on the web. I sincerely hope you liked this blog article! With this knowledge, you should be able to effectively use the Python Selenium API.

Tanya Chhikara
Dec, 27 2022