Download website information in HTML document through LabVIEW 2009

[JacobBrinkmann]

Hello,

I would like to explain the application of my question: I would like to access a music website to download new music everyday using LabVIEW 2009. I also want it to prompt me to listen to music I have not heard yet and decide, based on my input, whether to delete the mp3 file or to import the song into a specified iTunes playlist.

I have no formal training in LabVIEW, only low level experience knowledge.

My main question is: How can I download the HTML file into LabVIEW?

Please see the attached file, which is the minimal progress I have made so far.

I really appreciate any and all inputs and feedback on this topic. If there is already a forum topic that may help me better understand the limitations of LabVIEW and program interfaces, feel free to point me in some direction.

Thank you for your time,

Jake Brinkmann

Design Test Engineer

Sencore Inc., Sioux Falls, SD

[Ben]

Datasocket open to the URL of interest and use a datasocket read to read the page and pasre as required.

Ben

[JacobBrinkmann]

Ben,

That worked great. Thank you very much.

I've attached the new VI if anyone else wants to do the same thing.

[JackDunaway]

1. Note that it's not even necessary to use the DS Open and Close... I have used simply DS Read with no hiccups.
2. Also, postpend the URL with "[text]" (minus the quotes) to ensure binary transfer. Seems like I've run into issues before with DS attempting to interpret all characters as ASCII rather than multibyte Unicode encodings such as UTF-8...
3. I would use a "String" input rather than a "Variant" for the datatype on the DS read. Typically, the return value of DS functions will be parsed (for instance, using HTTP protocol to fetch HTML), or simply written to a binary file (such as fetching an image via FTP protocol)
4. DS Read natively supports FTP and HTTP transfer protocols.
5. I've done tests that showed Datasocket transfers using FTP protocol were 10% faster than the Internet Toolkit FTP transfer VI's. I also prefer Datasocket because it's more "primitive" and does not require as many dependents in the VI hierarchy.

Attached is a VI I've got stashed my library. Use it as you see fit.