Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Htmlq: like jq, but for html

github.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

131–140 of 172 posts

Re: Htmlq: like jq, but for html

#131

Post by philipswood »

digitalsushi wrote: post #93
srg0 wrote: post #75

"htmlq: like jq, but for HTML" "jq is like sed for JSON data" sed: "While in some ways similar to an editor which permits scripted edits (_such as ed_), sed works by making only one pass over the input(s)" ed: "ed is a line-oriented text editor". Software definition through a reference to another software is somewhat confusing. Potential users come from different backgrounds (I had no idea what is jq), and it is not…

"htmlq is like jq but for html" is a very specific 'dog whistle' for people who use jq. I agree that people who don't know what jq is will get no value and pay no attention. But for people who use jq, the claim is, like a dog whistle, clear, concise, and means exactly what it says. In two seconds, everyone using both jq and html will instantly know what is available and log it away. So for general purposes, it's a te…

I can't speak for people who don't know jq, but knowing jq, this is a great tagline: it gives me an immediate understanding of what it does, how I could expect to use it and what value and ease of use I can expect.

I'll be trying it out next time I'm on a PC.

Re: Htmlq: like jq, but for html

#132

Post by lostcolony »

the_jeremy wrote: post #116
triska wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In a certain sense (for example, when measuring brevity), it is indeed easy to write this example in Python. However, the Python version also illustrates that many different language constructs are needed to express the intended functionality. In comparison to Prolog, Python is a quite complex language with many different language constructs, including loops, objects, methods, assignment, dictionaries etc. all of whi…

The benefit of Python is that developers already know about these language constructs, and that more developers know Python than Prolog.

I don't think the op's point was "how easy it would be to hire developers", or even "taking all the considerations a business is under, I feel Prolog makes sense". He was just touting how easy Prolog's built in pattern matching and declarative style makes implementing and using selectors at a language level.

Honestly, if we didn't talk about the benefits of a language irrespective of how easy it is to hire for it, we'd never have introduced anything beyond FORTRAN, if we even made it that far. Bringing "X is easier to hire for" into a conversation about the language is, at best, a non-sequitur.

Re: Htmlq: like jq, but for html

#133

Post by berkes »

alpha_squared wrote: post #105
berkes wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd like to add my support here too, but with a note. When scraping and parsing (or writing integration test DSL), I always start out with CSS selectors. But always hit cases where they lack or require hoop-jumping and then fall back on Xpath. I then have a codebase with both CSS-Sel and Xpath, which is arguably worse then having only one method. I suspect here, one uses this tool untill CSS selector limitations are…

Do you mind giving an example? I'm having trouble following where CSS is limited for selection.

Like other commentor says: parent/child. But also selecting by content (e.g. "click the button with the delete-icon" or "find the link with '@harrypotter') or selecting by attributes (e.g. click the pager-item that goes to next page) or selecting items outside of body (e.g. og-tags, title etc). All are doable in CSS3 selectors, but everything shouts that they are not meant for this; whereas xpath does this far more natural.

Re: Htmlq: like jq, but for html

#134

Post by RobertKerans »

ritchiea wrote: post #127
chownie wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's supposed to be "bits of content", it's not jargon. The author's just accidentally a word, we all do it.

It's more than fair to say in technical documentation you intend others to use having a grammatical error or missing word is confusing and a problem. It's the writing equivalent of having a bug in your code. And it's definitely not "writing to a target audience" as the parent comment suggested. We all make mistakes but don't try to call a mistake effective documentation.

Of course it is, but neither parent nor anyone else is saying anything close to the mistake being effective documentation. There's a single missing word which needs to be added in, but the overall text is clearly writing to a target audience. You are aware of this, and of how small the mistake is, and you understand what the sentence should read as, so I'm not sure what your point is?

Re: Htmlq: like jq, but for html

#135

Post by mgdm »

theIV wrote: post #126
zerocount wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree. The 2nd sentence contains, "extract bits content." What is that? If you're going to write a minimal introduction, at least make sure it's not confusing. I get the feeling the author felt compelled to write an introduction and did so with as little effort as possible.

My hunch is that this is a typo and it should read "extract bits OF content."

Exactly this! I’ll fix it after work.

Re: Htmlq: like jq, but for html

#136

Post by hyperpallium2 »

dotancohen wrote: post #55
hyperpallium2 wrote: post #43

From examples, this is only like jq in the sense that the q stands for the same thing. Even the way it does that is different. An xmlq that was really like jq would be fun, about 20 years ago.

There is `xq` today, which parses XML like `jq`. I think that it is relatively unknown because it is part of the `yq` package for parsing YMAL. So just install `yq` via PIP and you'll get `xq` as well. There is also `xmlstarlet` for parsing XML in a similar fashion.

xmlstarlet is really nothing like jq, as a language. But yes, I use it because it is the best commandline xml processor I'd found. That's the only similarity to jq.

Is this the yq? https://kislyuk.github.io/yq/ It does contain an 'xq', as a literal wrapper for jq, piping output into it after transcoding XML to JSON using xmltodict https://github.com/martinblech/xmltodict (which explodes xml into separate JSON data structures).

This is a bash one-liner! But TBF it really is a 'jq for xml'. I think it would be horrible for some things, but you could also do a lot of useful things painlessly.

Re: Htmlq: like jq, but for html

#138

Post by kbenson »

srg0 wrote: post #75

"htmlq: like jq, but for HTML" "jq is like sed for JSON data" sed: "While in some ways similar to an editor which permits scripted edits (_such as ed_), sed works by making only one pass over the input(s)" ed: "ed is a line-oriented text editor". Software definition through a reference to another software is somewhat confusing. Potential users come from different backgrounds (I had no idea what is jq), and it is not…

> Software definition through a reference to another software is somewhat confusing.

Possibly, depending on background as you note, but not all promotion is intended at the same audience. When submitting to HN, "like jq, but for X" is short and conveys what it is to most the people that would care, I think. jq has been submitted and talked about here many times with lively discussion over the years.[1] At this point I think most those that are interested in what that is and what this is will understand fairly quickly from the title. Those that don't might be missed, or they might look it up like you, or they might see it through some other submission some other time with a different title which isn't based on a chain of references.

1: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...

Re: Htmlq: like jq, but for html

#139

Post by dotancohen »

hyperpallium2 wrote: post #136
dotancohen wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is `xq` today, which parses XML like `jq`. I think that it is relatively unknown because it is part of the `yq` package for parsing YMAL. So just install `yq` via PIP and you'll get `xq` as well. There is also `xmlstarlet` for parsing XML in a similar fashion.

xmlstarlet is really nothing like jq, as a language. But yes, I use it because it is the best commandline xml processor I'd found. That's the only similarity to jq. Is this the yq? https://kislyuk.github.io/yq/ It does contain an 'xq', as a literal wrapper for jq, piping output into it after transcoding XML to JSON using xmltodict https://github.com/martinblech/xmltodict (which explodes xml into separate JSON data st…

Thank you for the comments. I've only recently discovered both tools, and literally used them once each. Of the two `xq` was easier for my particular work case (parsing a Magento config) but I keep both tools in my virtual toolbox.

If you have any other suggestions for parsing XML for exploratory purposes I'm very happy to hear them.

Re: Htmlq: like jq, but for html

#140

Post by ramses0 »

samhw wrote: post #63
chriswarbo wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks, that's a rare example of something which is (a) simple enough to understand for a Prolog-newbie like me, and (b) more practical than ubiquitous family-tree example. I'm always looking for opportunities to dip my toes into Prolog; in hindsight it's clearly a good fit for tree-structured data structures.

Interestingly, the only other context in which I've come across Prolog is from friends who studied at Cambridge, here in the UK. For some reason, the CS 'tripos' (course) there is really heavily focussed on Prolog, and everyone I know from there ended up a huge fan of the language. I'm not sure why that's the case, though, given that almost all other universities seem to use more common languages (Java, C++, etc).

"Prolog as a library" => Given "functional" constraints => $CONSTRAINTS.prolog( "query..." ) => results

...many languages (similar to regex / state-machine) can benefit greatly from offloading a portion to something prolog-ish, but it's unfortunate that prolog knowledge isn't as widely distributed.

Post reply on HN