1. Course ID: 219152
2. Course Name: Web Scraping with Python (Python網頁擷取程式設計)
3. Instructor: Dr. Quincy Wu
4. Target Students: Juniors, Seniors, and Postgraduates
5. Upperlimit: 10 Students
6. Credit: 3
7. Overview: This course teaches you web scraping and crawling techniques to access unlimited data from any web source in any format. With this practical guide, you’ll learn how to use Python scripts and web APIs to gather and process data from thousands--or even millions--of web pages at once. It is ideal for programmers, security professionals, and web administrators familiar with Python. This course not only teaches basic web scraping mechanics, but also delves into more advanced topics, such as analyzing raw data or using scrapers for frontend website testing.
8. Evaluation:
   • Homework (60%)
   • Term Project (40%)
9. Textbook:
   • Ryan Mitchell, "Web Scraping with Python", O'Reilly 2015.
     
   • 中譯本: 網站擷取, 2016.
10. Outline:
    1. Python at a Glance
    2. BeautifulSoup - Your First Web Scrapper
    3. Advanced HTML Parsing
    4. Starting to Crawl
    5. Using APIs
       • [HW] Central Weather Bureau OpenData
    6. Storing Data
    7. Reading Documents
    8. Cleaning Your Dirty Data
    9. Reading and Writing Natural Languages
       • [YouTube] DFS and BFS
    10. Crawling Through Forms and Logins
        • [HW] Lunar Calendar
    11. Scraping JavaScript
    12. Image Processing and Text Recognition
    13. Avoiding Scrapping Traps
        • Rejected:
        • [HW] http://www.nthu.edu.tw/periodical
    14. Testing Your Website with Scrapers
        • Free Site Crawler and Google Sitemap Generator
        • Crawler Generator
    15. Scraping Remotely
    16. Final Presentation

Hours Arrangement

• Problem statement and demonstration
• Tools introduction
• Design and hands-on trial
• Bonus: Your own problem
• Bonus: Easier (not necessarily more powerful) tools