How to parse a table with odd, different sized cells?

[greencracker]

Now, there must be some neat trick …

I’m parsing this table, row by row … no problem.

Until I come to a

How do I tell both rows that they should both take 6 in column 0 ??

---

  |      A          |

6 |_________|
| B |
___|_________|

Target website: http://www.webbotsspidersscreenscrapers.com/DSP_targets.php

This script gives a MySQL error obviously, but it’s so you can see my thinking.

[php]

$product_array=array();
$product_count=0;

Download the target (store) web page

$target = “http://www.webbotsspidersscreenscrapers.com/DSP_targets.php”;
$web_page = http_get($target, “”);

Parse all the tables on the web page into an array

$table_array = parse_array($web_page[‘FILE’], “<table”, “”);

Look for the table that contains the product information

for($xx=0; $xx<count($table_array); $xx++)
{
$table_landmark = “Name”;
if(stristr($table_array[$xx], $table_landmark)) // Process this table
{
echo “FOUND: Product table\n”;

    $product_row_array = parse_array($table_array[$xx], "<tr", "</tr>");
    
    for($table_row=0; $table_row<count($product_row_array); $table_row++)
        {
        $heading_landmark = "Name";
        if((stristr($product_row_array[$table_row], $heading_landmark)))
            {
            echo "FOUND: Table heading row\n";
            
            $table_cell_array = parse_array($product_row_array[$table_row], "<td", "</td>");
            for($heading_cell=0; $heading_cell<count($table_cell_array); $heading_cell++)
                {
                if(stristr(strip_tags(trim($table_cell_array[$heading_cell])), "chapter"))
                    $chapter_column = $heading_cell;
                if(stristr(strip_tags(trim($table_cell_array[$heading_cell])), "name"))
                    $name_column = $heading_cell;
                }
            echo "FOUND: chapter_column=$chapter_column\n";
            echo "FOUND: name_column=$name_column\n";
          
            
            
            $heading_row = $table_row;
            }
        $ending_landmark = "Nasa Viking";
        if((stristr($product_row_array[$table_row], $ending_landmark)))
           {
           echo "PARSING COMPLETE!\n";
           break;
           }
            
        if(isset($heading_row) && $heading_row<$table_row)
            {
            $table_cell_array = parse_array($product_row_array[$table_row], "<td", "</td>");
            $product_array[$product_count]['Chapter'] =
                strip_tags(trim($table_cell_array[$chapter_column]));
            $product_array[$product_count]['Name'] =
                strip_tags(trim($table_cell_array[$name_column]));
            $product_count++;
            echo "PROCESSED: Item#$product_count\n";
            }
        }
    }
}

for($xx=0; $xx<count($product_array); $xx++)
    {
    
    echo "$xx. ";
    echo "Chapter: ".$product_array[$xx]['chapter'].", ";
    echo "Name: ".$product_array[$xx]['name'].", ";
   
    scraperwiki::save(array('name', 'chapter'), $product_array);   
    
    }    

?>[/php]

[RaythXC]

I don’t quite get what you mean? I think you want the colspan option.

[code]

[/code]

[ErnieAlex]

Well, if I understand what you are trying to do, you want to keep ‘6’ for two rows.
Therefore, you would have to have a counter for that col and use the rowspan’s number as a starting count.
The counter would be dropped by one at the next row. If it equals zero, then do the next row…

Did that make sense? To repeat another way. There is no easy way to parse thru the extra row.
You have to create a flag or counter to help you. You would start at the first row, of course…
If you see a rowspan, you set up the counter and save this value of the first col for future use.
Then, fall into your row parsing. When you start back on the next row, subtract one from the counter.
If it is zero, start a real new row. If not zero, then use the saved value of the first col…

Some of the code would be tricky, but, is fairly straightforward! Good luck…