09.28.06
Posted in Updates at 10:50 am by Todd Wilson
Yeah, we kind of silently released 2.7.2.15a, for those of you who are keeping track. We didn’t do as much testing on it as we normally do, so I didn’t want to make it known too broadly. 2.7.2.16a is performing nicely, so feel free to have at it. There are a few new little doo-dads and minor fixes in this one. The auto-scroll on the log panel seems to be getting high marks around here. Provecho!
The usual caveats apply–this is alpha software, so use it at your own risk. Thanks, though, to anyone willing to help us test.
If you’re currently running version 2.7.2.9a or higher you can upgrade via Options -> Check for updates. If you’re using anything else, follow these instructions (see this page for details on why you need to follow these steps):
- Back up your scraping sessions (check here for help on that).
- Ensure screen-scraper isn’t currently running (close the workbench and server, if running).
- Download this file, and unzip it.
- Copy the contents of the zip file on top of your existing files in the screen-scraper install folder. For example, the zip file contains a “screen-scraper.jar” file which should be copied on top of your existing “screen-scraper.jar” file.
- Edit your “resource\conf\screen-scraper.properties” file in a text editor. Change the “Version” property to “2.7.2.16a”.
- Launch the screen-scraper workbench.
- If all of your scraping sessions have disappeared, don’t panic!
- Close the screen-scraper workbench.
- Re-open the screen-scraper workbench.
You’re done!
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09.13.06
Posted in Updates at 4:44 pm by Todd Wilson
Not too much new in this one. It more or less just cleans up some annoying bugs that crept into the previous versions.
The usual caveats apply–this is alpha software, so use it at your own risk. Thanks, though, to anyone willing to help us test.
If you’re currently running version 2.7.2.9a or higher you can upgrade via Options -> Check for updates. If you’re using anything else, follow these instructions (see this page for details on why you need to follow these steps):
- Back up your scraping sessions (check here for help on that).
- Ensure screen-scraper isn’t currently running (close the workbench and server, if running).
- Download this file, and unzip it.
- Copy the contents of the zip file on top of your existing files in the screen-scraper install folder. For example, the zip file contains a “screen-scraper.jar” file which should be copied on top of your existing “screen-scraper.jar” file.
- Edit your “resource\conf\screen-scraper.properties” file in a text editor. Change the “Version” property to “2.7.2.14a”.
- Launch the screen-scraper workbench.
- If all of your scraping sessions have disappeared, don’t panic!
- Close the screen-scraper workbench.
- Re-open the screen-scraper workbench.
You’re done!
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09.12.06
Posted in Miscellaneous, Thoughts at 10:49 am by Todd Wilson
A while back I flew out to Huntsville, AL to work with a government contractor company on automating the testing of embedded devices. To this day I’m not entirely sure what these little machines did, but they each had a web interface that needed testing (much like that of a wireless router, if you’ve worked with those before). This isn’t the most common usage for screen-scraper, but it turned out to be just what they needed.
I worked closely with Greg Chapman, one of their engineers, and he recently wrote an article on the experience entitled Testing aerospace UUTs leads to Web solution. Greg’s a smart guy, and has continued to use screen-scraper in ways that I wouldn’t have even considered.
It’s gratifying to see screen-scraper used in so many different ways, but it’s interesting that it’s versatility has almost been a curse at times to us. Our software can be used for all kinds of purposes, but we’re finding that, from a business standpoint, we’re often better off narrowing our focus to very specific applications. As one marketing expert we consulted with put it, “You guys have plastic.” Plastic is incredibly useful, but it gains value as you craft it into something with a specific purpose. I’m planning on blogging about this idea more later, but it’s interesting to consider the pros and cons of a general-purpose tool, like screen-scraper.
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09.07.06
Posted in Updates at 11:33 am by Todd Wilson
Come ‘n get it! Several clean-ups in this one, as well as a few new features. screen-scraper will now back up its database automatically. It’s rare, but we still get reports occasionally of corrupted screen-scraper databases (which can often mean loss of work). We use a database called Hypersonic, which can be amazingly fragile if its process crashes for some reason. With the automatic backups, hopefully nobody loses their work (or much of their work) in the event that their database gets hosed.
The usual caveats apply–this is alpha software, so use it at your own risk. Thanks, though, to anyone willing to help us test.
If you’re currently running version 2.7.2.9a or higher you can upgrade via Options -> Check for updates. If you’re using anything else, follow these instructions (see this page for details on why you need to follow these steps):
- Back up your scraping sessions (check here for help on that).
- Ensure screen-scraper isn’t currently running (close the workbench and server, if running).
- Download this file, and unzip it.
- Copy the contents of the zip file on top of your existing files in the screen-scraper install folder. For example, the zip file contains a “screen-scraper.jar” file which should be copied on top of your existing “screen-scraper.jar” file.
- Edit your “resource\conf\screen-scraper.properties” file in a text editor. Change the “Version” property to “2.7.2.13a”.
- Launch the screen-scraper workbench.
- If all of your scraping sessions have disappeared, don’t panic!
- Close the screen-scraper workbench.
- Re-open the screen-scraper workbench.
You’re done!
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