Follow the instructions in the Python Quick Start Guide to install Homebrew, Git, PostGIS, Python 3.3+ and virtualenv.

mkvirtualenv scrapers-ca --python=`which python3`
git clone https://github.com/opencivicdata/scrapers-ca.git
cd scrapers-ca
pip install -r requirements.txt

Initialize the database:

createdb pupa
psql pupa -c "CREATE EXTENSION postgis;"
pupa dbinit ca

If you get an error like "no password supplied", then you need to configure the default DATABASE_URL in pupa_settings.py, e.g. postgis://USERNAME:PASSWORD@localhost/pupa.

pupa update ca_ab_edmonton

To run only the scraping step and skip the import step add the --scrape switch:

pupa update --scrape ca_ab_edmonton

For documentation on the pupa command:

pupa -h

For documentation on the update subcommand:

pupa update -h

See the first few steps of this wiki page to create a scraper.

Read the Pupa documentation or an existing scraper's code.

Avoid using the XPath string() function unless the expression is known to not have matches on some pages. Otherwise, scrapers may continue to run without error despite failing to find a match. A comment like # can be empty or # allow string() should accompany the use of string().

Use the get_email and get_phone helpers as much as possible.

In late 2014/early 2015, we disabled some single-jurisdiction scrapers to lower maintenance costs, some of which have been re-enabled, and disabled all multi-jurisdiction scrapers, because Pupa didn't support them. The disabled scrapers are in disabled/.

We heavily modify Pupa's validations in patch.py to be as strict as possible in order to keep data quality high. We subclass Pupa's Scraper, Jurisdiction and Person classes in utils.py to reduce code duplication and to correct common data quality issues.

List the available maintenance tasks:

invoke -l

Make the code style consistent:

flake8

Check module names, class names, classification, division_name, name and url in __init.py__ files:

invoke tidy

Check sources are credited and assertions are made:

invoke sources_and_assertions

Check jurisdiction URLs (look for Delete COUNCIL_PAGE or Missing COUNCIL_PAGE instructions):

invoke council_pages

Update the OCD-IDs:

curl -O https://raw.githubusercontent.com/opencivicdata/ocd-division-ids/master/identifiers/country-ca.csv

Check whether any non-authoritative CSVs are likely to be stale:

invoke csv_stale

Check whether any CSV errors can be reported to data publishers:

invoke csv_error

Scraper code rarely undergoes code review. The focus is on the quality of the data.

This repository is on GitHub: https://github.com/opencivicdata/scrapers-ca, where your contributions, forks, bug reports, feature requests, and feedback are greatly welcomed.

Copyright (c) 2013 Open North Inc., released under the MIT license