Everyone should be ordering online regardless of age or increased risk. Limiting contact with individuals is the only way to stop the spread of this disease. The answer is that the surge in demand for delivery should quickly be filled on the supply side by delivery companies. The increase in business should go to providing hazard pay, PPE, and benefits for the supplying workers. This limits the number of people in contact with others while supplying jobs for those who have been unemployed during this time while increasing pay and benefits for those workers due to their increased risk vs reward. This is how capitalism is supposed to work in theory at least, to quickly adjust to market needs.
I had to build a web scraper to buy groceries
161–170 of 175 posts
Re: I had to build a web scraper to buy groceries
#162Earlier quoted context omitted.
38% of the people hospitalized with COVID-19 are between 20 and 54. [1] Everyone can catch the illness, everyone can wind up in the hospital, and depending on the state of the local hospitals, everyone is in immediate danger. [1] https://www.msn.com/en-ca/health/medical/close-to-40percent-...
That 38% figure is not relevent in this context, because it does not control for the demographics of the population in general. 45% of admisions are over 65, despite the fact that >65 makes up only 16% of the total population [0]. Further, according the the underlying report, of the 22-44 year olds admitted to the hospital, only 2-4% went to the ICU. The 75–84 bracket had 11%–31% admitance to the ICU. Of the deaths r…
Agree with your point (that raw % of hospitalizations is misleading), but it's 2-4% of total positive cases, not 2-4% of those admitted to hospital.
Re: I had to build a web scraper to buy groceries
#163Why is grocery delivery considered a ‘safer’ option than going to the store yourself. I actually prefer to do it myself. I’d rather be the one to lay hands on all my own products. Why would you trust an unknown group of people to take all the proper precautions? Who picked the item by hand? Who is this bringing it to your door? Are you sure they washed hands? Did they accidentally sneeze on anything? Is the vehicle s…
The primary mode of transmission is through droplets from coughing and sneezing. Minimizing the amount of time you spend around other people is by far the most effective way to avoid getting the virus. If you put away the delivered items, wash your hands, and then don't return to the kitchen for a few hours, then it doesn't matter if the delivery person infected your items. The virus can't last all that long outside…
Fair points. Some folks are saying just wipe all your items down before storing, seems like a fine solution. I don’t know if I’d trust how long the virus survives. We might not really know yet, I’ve seen varying reports on that.
Re: I had to build a web scraper to buy groceries
#164It seems like a lot of demand issues highlighted by the pandemic could be solved by queues. Instead of saying "there are no slots available", put the user in the queue. Process the queue in order. The improvement in wait time and demand accuracy would be a win for both consumers and the business.
Ocado in the UK do exactly this, using queue-it [0]. On some sites, apparently queue-jumping is as simple as disabling javascript (n.b. Ocado [1] have been in the game longer than most, and this does not work on their site). [0] https://queue-it.com/ [1] https://ocado.queue-it.net/
This does work on Ocado, but you also need to disable redirects also by the way
Re: I had to build a web scraper to buy groceries
#165Of all the grocery companies in my area, only Walmart has it right: Choose an available pick up time, then start online shopping. All the others let you fill your cart, then at checkout tell you there are no slots available until the end of time. Waste of time, energy, and hope. F U, Target, Safeway, Albertsons, and Kroger.
Kudos to the developers at Walmart Labs. They clearly know their stuff.
If only they'd revisit some of the internal apps. Some of them have been revisited and are great, and some... Well, to be fair, perhaps they lost the code base back in the early 00s.
Re: I had to build a web scraper to buy groceries
#166Amazon Fresh (until a few days ago) was releasing slots 3 days out each night at midnight, so I've been saying up to place orders. Now it seems incremental throughout the day, but I've gotten lucky and nicked a spot. However, they don't have everything I need even normally. Now, it's even worse, so I have to order from multiple places. The local Mart's that deliver are still opening their slots at midnight, though us…
Still better then Wal-Mart’s site where everything is in-store pick up, and Target’s site where everything is out but you can’t tell until you click into the item and try to put it into a basket. My only gripe with Amazon is that it’s too hard to distinguish between them and their third party sellers, and it’s a pain to deal with the sellers. I also wish there was a button to report price gouging - I was looking for…
Yeah, emergen-c is either sold out or price gouged, a pattern seen across most vitamin-c products. But take a look at this-- it's a powdered form that can be mixed. Water works, but OJ might taste better. And the price per dose is very good: https://www.amazon.com/Ascorbic-Antioxidant-Smoothie-Pharmac... As of this comment at least, it's in stock, about $28, there are other brands available too (search vitamin c powder) and it's at least as price-efficient per dose as normal pills/chewables.
Also, if you have Amazon Fresh, Amazon's Whole Foods, or Amazon Pantry (just opened again) available in your area, 3rd party price gougers aren't really an issue.
Re: I had to build a web scraper to buy groceries
#167Earlier quoted context omitted.
Walmart is also tied for my top spot for in-person shopping during this. Walmart gets that spot because of their mobile app which does a pretty good job of telling me what is in stock at my local store. My other top choice is a small (three store) chain in Western Washington called Central Market [1]. (If the name seems familiar, it may be from season 10 of "Top Chef" which was set in Seattle. Top Chef normally sends…
New Seasons Markets in Oregon and Washington are doing all these steps as well.
PCC as well. Actually the ones not taking these steps are in the minority. Safeway and QFC are doing a few of these
Re: I had to build a web scraper to buy groceries
#168Earlier quoted context omitted.
Save-On-Foods has another - different issue. They normally let you modify orders, which is great. However I've noticed that modifying when there are no additional available time slots for your post code does not work. Your time slot stays reserved however upon trying to check out you will get told that they do not deliver to your area. Eventually new slots opened up and I could update my order but a frustrating bug a…
Did you let them know?
They appear to be aware based on their social media responses.
Re: I had to build a web scraper to buy groceries
#169Earlier quoted context omitted.
One hack around address limits is to put in a unit number. 1 Park Avenue or whatever in Manhattan will have multiple units in it. And if you live in one of these units you can add a letter, like "Unit 522B" which will just get delivered to your unit 522. Some companies have databases that know the layouts in each address but many do not.
And when the grocery delivery person comes and sees the addresses don't match, your address gets blacklisted.
Never happened to me. If there are no letters after unit numbers, and the delivery person sees a delivery for unit 522B, they'll leave it at 522.
Re: I had to build a web scraper to buy groceries
#170next, booking your grocery pickup as a service /s