How to use Python to interface with Web pages?

[Ralf Schoenian]

Peter wrote:
> Any help would be appreciated :-)
> 
> I want to write an auction sniping tool in Python. I know Python, but
> I know absolutely nothing about web pages, javascript etc i.e. I want
> the program to automatically log me into my eBay account, access the
> appropriate item, locate how many mins/seconds until the bid time ends
> and then automatically place a bid at the last possible moment.
> 
> I can see the web-page source - it looks to be javascript (to my
> untutored eye :-)).
> 
> But how do I enter data and "simulated" mouse presses on a web-page
> that I have accessed via a Python program?
> 
> So where can I start to learn how to do this? Any books available? web
> resources that show examples or offer tutorials?
> 
> I have (in the past) written some python to scoop data off web-sites
> but I have never written anything that interactively interacts with
> the web-page contents and don't know where to even start on this one.
> 
> Thanks for any help/pointers
> 
> Peter

Hi,

a good starting point possibly is 
http://wwwsearch.sourceforge.net/mechanize/

Regards,
Ralf