How to extract data from a currently open tab in Chrome using C#

Question

How to extract data from a currently open tab in Chrome using C#

Currently, I am working on developing a console application using c# .net. One specific functionality that I require is to extract data from an external website, which involves signing in to access the information. I have managed to open the necessary page with the required credentials using process.start in Chrome; however, I encountered difficulty in retrieving the data from the webpage. I attempted various methods, such as obtaining the source code, but unfortunately, none of them maintained the session, leading to only error page source code being retrieved. Perhaps there could be an alternate approach utilizing JavaScript or c# that would enable successful data extraction?

javascript c#.net console-application

Answer 1

Answer №1

Utilize the WebClient API to authenticate and retrieve page data. To maintain a session, ensure that it is cookie aware. It is necessary to reference the System.Web Assembly in your console application to use this API.

public class CookieAwareWebClient : WebClient
{
    public CookieAwareWebClient()
    {
        CookieContainer = new CookieContainer();
    }
    public CookieContainer CookieContainer { get; private set; }

    protected override WebRequest GetWebRequest(Uri address)
    {
        var request = (HttpWebRequest)base.GetWebRequest(address);
        request.CookieContainer = CookieContainer;
        return request;
    }
}

Now implement it as follows:

using (var client = new CookieAwareWebClient())
{
    var values = new NameValueCollection
    {
        { "username", "jane" },
        { "password", "classified" },
    };
    client.UploadValues("http://domain.loc/login.aspx", values);

    // With a successful authentication, we can now access the protected page
    string result = client.DownloadString("http://domain.loc/dashboard.aspx");
}

This code snippet was sourced from WebClient accessing page with credentials

Answer 2

Utilize the WebClient API to authenticate and retrieve page data. To maintain a session, ensure that it is cookie aware. It is necessary to reference the System.Web Assembly in your console application to use this API.

public class CookieAwareWebClient : WebClient
{
    public CookieAwareWebClient()
    {
        CookieContainer = new CookieContainer();
    }
    public CookieContainer CookieContainer { get; private set; }

    protected override WebRequest GetWebRequest(Uri address)
    {
        var request = (HttpWebRequest)base.GetWebRequest(address);
        request.CookieContainer = CookieContainer;
        return request;
    }
}

Now implement it as follows:

using (var client = new CookieAwareWebClient())
{
    var values = new NameValueCollection
    {
        { "username", "jane" },
        { "password", "classified" },
    };
    client.UploadValues("http://domain.loc/login.aspx", values);

    // With a successful authentication, we can now access the protected page
    string result = client.DownloadString("http://domain.loc/dashboard.aspx");
}

This code snippet was sourced from WebClient accessing page with credentials

How to extract data from a currently open tab in Chrome using C#

Answer №1

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