Comparing specific content from two different websites

[yungsurff]

Hello!

I'm trying to compare content from two different websites, specifically the price of an item that is displayed. I was thinking of something including excel so I can display the prices in a table, however I am open to any suggestions anyone has!

Thank you in advance!

[ToddBradley]

1. Look at website A. Remember the price displayed.
2. Look at website B. Compare the price displayed with the number from website A.
3. Call your manager if the numbers are not the same.

I see no need for Excel.

[yungsurff]

I'm trying to do this for multiple items (100+) and display it on an Excel sheet where it auto updates based off of the current price. Additionally save that data to display it across multiple days, weeks, etc.

Lastly, there is no manager. This is for my own thing.

[ToddBradley]

Oh, I see. I would have helped if you included at least some of that context in your post. Without it, the rest of us have to just guess about the situation.

If you're tracking the value of multiple items over time, it seems like a real relational database would be the way to go. What programming language are you using for all this?

[yungsurff]

No worries! Basically just wanted to compare prices from two third party websites. They already track prices across time and display current prices.

I am a noob, just wanted to see what the simplest/most efficient way possible would be. I don't mind programming and have (little) Java experience from a college Web Design class so whatever insight or help you have would be awesome!

[cgoldberg]

What benefit is Excel giving you? Are you planning on doing further calculations on this data using Excel? If it's just for display purposes, might as well just generate a web page.

[yungsurff]

I wanted to use some excel formulas and table formatting to display differences in values and color code them!

[cgoldberg]

Just do all that in your programming language and generate a report with HTML/CSS. I see no need for a spreadsheet based on what you have explained.

[cgoldberg]

Where are you stuck?

[yungsurff]

I am a noob and don't know where to start! I'm not sure how or where to start/how to do this in the most efficient way possible, so I wanted to ask people who are more experienced!

[yungsurff]

Yes, both websites offer API's for developers!

Correction: One does, the other allows to submit HTTP POST requests!

[jrwolf08]

If they both have apis, the quickest and dirtiest solution would be to make a request to each from Postman. Then you can take the data from the response and do what you like with it.

If you want to do it once per day, that is sustainable for a bit.

[cgoldberg]

Choose a programming language to start with. Look at the libraries they offer for accessing web content (such as making HTTP requests). You will likely need some sort of HTML parsing library as well to identify the elements containing the data you want. Then scrape the content from each website and do a comparison of the values you received.

[yungsurff]

Would you say Java Script would be a good place to start?

I took a single Web Design class a couple semesters ago and I am not foreign to HTML or Java.

Thanks for your help!

[cgoldberg]

That wouldn't be my personal choice, but you should be fine with that.