The Internet is bigger and better than what a mere browser allows. Webbots, Spiders, and Screen Scrapers is for programmers and businesspeople who want to take full advantage of the vast resources available on the Web. The book first outlines the deficiencies of browsers, and then explains how these deficiencies can be exploited in the design and deployment of task-specific webbots.As they follow along, readers learn how to write stealthy webbots that send and receive email and text messages, manage cookies, and decode encrypted files. Sample projects reinforce these new skills so that readers can create more sophisticated bots to track online prices, download entire websites, and bid on auctions in their closing moments. This second edition of Webbots, Spiders, and Screen Scrapers has been completely updated and revised to cover the latest trends in web crawling, including new chapters on text parsing, browser macros, anonymizers, and more.