Book Details
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Author:Kevin Hemenway & Tara Calishan
Pages:422
Publisher:O'Reilly
Rating: 6/10
Reviewer:CIQUERY - support@ciquery
ISBN:0596005776
The background
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The "Spidering Hacks" applies a combination of opensource principles to authoring
and instructional manual. Over 24 authors were involved in developing the content
for this book of Spidering hacks.There is a small bio of every author , which I found
to be useful , and reflects the wide diversity of authors.
Hello, Spidering Hacks
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I am a novice Perl programmer and it is quite clear that
this book is not a teaching programming book, I expected to dip
in ,grasp some of the more basic principles and push myself with some
of the more complex aspects.Ultimately, to make the most of this book,
you have to have a basic grasp of the Perl language, but that is not to say
you have to be an expert. Predominantly, there are some great ideas to be applied
to any language environment.
What's bad?
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So, who is this book targeted at? The cover notes make it clear that the book has
a multiple personality, attempting to satisfy programmers and "non-techie" researchers.
I find this an unusual direction , and I do understand it is tempting and maybe, even
necessary to satisfy both audiences at once, the final result is slightly
skewed.
There is no mention on the cover that this is a book the uses Perl exclusively
for the programming examples.As a user it is necessary to plow into the book and
derive information form the opening chapters
What's Good?
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Spidering Hacks has all the characteristics of a good "how to" book: clear,
easy to read exposition of the main issues, why they're important, and,
technically, excellently documented code written for an increasingly
complex topic.
The book is broken down into 6 chapters (outlined below) . Each one is clearly
headed and allows the reader to explore different issues within a given topic.
This is particularly useful , if you are looking for a fresh way of looking
at a problem or if you simply want to learn something new.
The pattern is to introduce the user to a plan of how to implement a Spidering strategy.
There is information on spidering best practice, reliable tools etc.
In other words if you had some working knowledge of Perl and a good internet connection,
you could be in action quite quickly
As an individual who is involved with developing and implementing spiders (using Java)
I found this to be a stimulating read. The Hacks are interesting in themselves , but also
a starting point for further ideas.
Chapters
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1.Walking Softly
2.Assembling a Toolbox
3.Collecting Media Files
4.Gleaning data from databases
5.Maintaining your collections
6.Giving back to the world
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