ghostscraper 0.9.8

A Playwright-based web scraper with persistent caching, parallel scraping, progress callbacks, and multiple output formats

Ghostscraper

Playwright-based async web scraper with persistent caching, subprocess isolation for memory safety, and multiple output formats.

Installation

pip install ghostscraper

Playwright browsers are installed automatically on first run.

Quick Start

import asyncio
from ghostscraper import GhostScraper

async def main():
    scraper = GhostScraper(url="https://example.com")
    print(await scraper.response_code())  # 200
    print(await scraper.text())           # plain text
    print(await scraper.markdown())       # markdown

asyncio.run(main())

GhostScraper

Constructor

GhostScraper(
    url: str = "",
    cache: bool = True,
    clear_cache: bool = False,
    ttl: int = 999,
    markdown_options: Optional[Dict[str, Any]] = None,
    logging: bool = True,
    dynamodb_table: Optional[str] = None,
    on_progress: Optional[Callable] = None,
    lazy: bool = False,
    **kwargs  # forwarded to PlaywrightScraper
)

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
url	str	""	URL to scrape
cache	bool	True	Enable caching. False disables all cache reads/writes
clear_cache	bool	False	Delete existing cache entry on init
ttl	int	999	Cache time-to-live in days
markdown_options	dict	None	Options forwarded to html2text.HTML2Text
logging	bool	True	Enable/disable log output
dynamodb_table	str	None	DynamoDB table name. When set, replaces local cache with DynamoDB
on_progress	Callable	None	Progress callback (sync or async). Errors are swallowed
lazy	bool	False	Skip cache restore on init. Used internally by ScrapeStream
**kwargs			Forwarded to PlaywrightScraper (see below). Note: cache, clear_cache, ttl, lazy, and markdown_options are consumed by GhostScraper and never reach PlaywrightScraper

PlaywrightScraper kwargs (passable to GhostScraper):

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
browser_type	str	"chromium"	"chromium", "firefox", or "webkit"
headless	bool	True	Run browser headlessly
browser_args	dict	None	Extra args for browser.launch()
context_args	dict	None	Extra args for browser.new_context()
max_retries	int	3	Retry attempts per URL
backoff_factor	float	2.0	Exponential backoff multiplier
network_idle_timeout	int	3000	Timeout (ms) for networkidle strategy
load_timeout	int	20000	Timeout (ms) for other strategies
wait_for_selectors	list	None	CSS selectors to wait for after page load
load_strategies	list	["load", "networkidle", "domcontentloaded"]	Loading strategy chain, tried in order
no_retry_on	list	None	Status codes that skip retries (e.g. [404, 410])
proxy	str	None	Proxy server URL (e.g. "socks5://localhost:1080", "http://proxy:8080"). For full proxy dict with username/password/bypass, use browser_args={"proxy": {...}} instead

Instance Attributes

Attribute	Type	Description
url	str	The URL this scraper was initialized with
error	Exception | None	Set when a fetch fails under fail_fast=False. When set, html() returns "" and response_code() returns None

Async Output Methods

All methods trigger a fetch (or cache restore) on first call. Subsequent calls return the cached/computed value.

Method	Returns	Description
await html()	str	Raw HTML. Returns "" if error is set
await response_code()	int | None	HTTP status code. Returns None if error is set
await response_headers()	dict	HTTP response headers
await redirect_chain()	list[dict]	List of {"url": str, "status": int} entries
await final_url()	str	Last URL in redirect chain. Falls back to self.url
await markdown()	str	HTML converted to Markdown via html2text
await text()	str	Plain text via newspaper4k
await authors()	list	Authors detected by newspaper4k
await article()	newspaper.Article	Full parsed article object
await soup()	BeautifulSoup	Parsed HTML
await seo()	dict	SEO metadata (see below)

SEO Dict Structure

All keys are omitted if the corresponding tag is absent:

{
    "title": str,           # <title>
    "description": str,     # <meta name="description">
    "canonical": str,       # <link rel="canonical">
    "robots": {             # <meta name="robots">
        "noindex": True,
        "nofollow": True,
    },
    "googlebot": { ... },   # same shape as robots
    "og": {                 # <meta property="og:*">
        "title": str,
        "description": str,
        "image": str,
        "url": str,
    },
    "twitter": { ... },     # <meta name="twitter:*">
    "hreflang": {           # <link rel="alternate" hreflang="...">
        "en-us": ["https://..."],
        "de": ["https://..."],
    }
}

Cache Methods

Method	Description
save_cache()	Persist cached fields to disk/DynamoDB
clear_cache_entry()	Delete this URL's cache entry
cache_stats()	Returns {"key": str, "exists": bool}
cache_list_keys(limit=100, last_key=None)	Returns {"keys": [...], "last_key": ...}

Deprecated Methods

These still work but emit DeprecationWarning:

Old	New
json_cache_save()	save_cache()
json_cache_save_db()	save_cache()
json_cache_clear()	clear_cache_entry()
json_cache_stats()	cache_stats()
json_cache_list_db_keys()	cache_list_keys()

Caching

Three cache modes, determined at construction:

Mode	Condition	Behavior
Local JSON	Default (cache=True, no dynamodb_table)	JSON files in data/ghostscraper/
DynamoDB	dynamodb_table is set	DynamoDB only via dynamorator (compressed). No local files
Disabled	cache=False	All cache operations are no-ops

Cached fields: _html, _response_code, _response_headers, _redirect_chain. Cache key: slugified URL. Derived outputs (markdown, text, authors, soup, seo, article) are computed in-memory and not persisted.

# Local cache (default)
scraper = GhostScraper(url="https://example.com")

# DynamoDB cache
scraper = GhostScraper(url="https://example.com", dynamodb_table="my-cache-table")

# No cache
scraper = GhostScraper(url="https://example.com", cache=False)

# Force re-fetch
scraper = GhostScraper(url="https://example.com", clear_cache=True)

Batch Scraping

scrapers = await GhostScraper.scrape_many(
    urls=["https://example.com", "https://python.org"],
    max_concurrent=5,
    ttl=7,
    load_strategies=["domcontentloaded"],
)
for scraper in scrapers:
    print(await scraper.text())

scrape_many Parameters

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
urls	list[str]	required	URLs to scrape
max_concurrent	int	15	Max concurrent page loads
logging	bool	True	Enable logging
fail_fast	bool	True	True: exception aborts batch. False: failed scrapers get error set
on_scraped	Callable	None	Callback per URL (sync or async). Fires for cached URLs too
browser_restart_every	int	None	Restart browser every N pages to cap memory growth
on_progress	Callable	None	Progress callback
**kwargs			Forwarded to GhostScraper and PlaywrightScraper

Returns List[GhostScraper] in the same order as urls. Already-cached URLs are skipped.

Partial Failure Handling

scrapers = await GhostScraper.scrape_many(urls=urls, fail_fast=False)
for s in scrapers:
    if s.error:
        print(f"FAILED {s.url}: {s.error}")
    else:
        print(f"OK {s.url}: {await s.response_code()}")

Memory-Efficient Batch Processing

results = []

async def handle(scraper: GhostScraper) -> None:
    results.append(await scraper.text())
    scraper._html = None  # release — already persisted to cache

await GhostScraper.scrape_many(urls=urls, max_concurrent=10, on_scraped=handle)

ScrapeStream

Memory-safe streaming for large URL sets. Each chunk runs in a disposable subprocess — when it exits, the OS reclaims all Chromium memory. Results are yielded one at a time via async for.

Creating a Stream

stream = GhostScraper.create_stream(
    urls=urls,
    dynamodb_table="my-cache-table",
    stream_id="my-seo-audit",
    priority=5,
    subprocess_batch_size=50,
    max_concurrent=10,
    on_progress=my_callback,
    # All other kwargs forwarded to GhostScraper/PlaywrightScraper
)

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
urls	list[str]	required	URLs to scrape
dynamodb_table	str	None	DynamoDB table for cache. Local cache used if None
stream_id	str	auto UUID	Identifier for monitoring/cancellation
priority	int	5	Lower = higher priority (0–10)
subprocess_batch_size	int	50	URLs per subprocess
max_concurrent	int	15	Concurrent pages within each subprocess
on_progress	Callable	None	Progress callback
**kwargs			Forwarded to GhostScraper/PlaywrightScraper

Consuming Results

async for scraper in stream:
    if scraper.error:
        print(f"FAILED {scraper.url}: {scraper.error}")
    else:
        text = await scraper.text()
        save_to_db(scraper.url, text)
    # scraper goes out of scope → GC reclaims

Monitoring

status = GhostScraper.get_stream_status("my-seo-audit")
# StreamStatus(stream_id, total, completed, failed, pending, status)
# status: "running" | "completed" | "cancelled"

all_streams = GhostScraper.get_all_streams()  # List[StreamStatus]

Cancellation

GhostScraper.cancel_stream("my-seo-audit")
# Current subprocess chunk finishes gracefully, then the async for loop ends

Shutdown

await GhostScraper.shutdown()
# Waits for running subprocesses, drains queue

Fetch Raw Bytes

Fetch a URL as raw bytes using the Playwright browser context. Useful for CDN-protected resources that block plain HTTP clients.

body, status_code, headers = await GhostScraper.fetch_bytes(
    "https://example.com/image.jpg",
    cache=True,
    ttl=30,
)

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
url	str	required	URL to fetch
cache	bool	False	Persist result to disk/DynamoDB
clear_cache	bool	False	Force re-fetch
ttl	int	999	Cache TTL in days
dynamodb_table	str	None	DynamoDB table
logging	bool	True	Enable logging
**kwargs			Forwarded to PlaywrightScraper

Returns Tuple[bytes, int, dict] — (body, status_code, headers).

Loading Strategies

Playwright loading strategies are tried in order, falling back on timeout:

1. load — waits for the load event. Works for most sites.
2. networkidle — waits until no network activity for 500ms. Better for JS-heavy pages.
3. domcontentloaded — waits only for HTML parsing. Fastest, least complete.

If all strategies fail, the attempt is retried up to max_retries times with exponential backoff.

# Per-scraper override
scraper = GhostScraper(url=url, load_strategies=["domcontentloaded"])

# Global override
ScraperDefaults.LOAD_STRATEGIES = ["domcontentloaded"]

Progress Callbacks

Pass on_progress to receive real-time events. Accepts sync and async callables. Errors inside the callback are swallowed.

scraper = GhostScraper(url="https://example.com", on_progress=lambda e: print(e["event"]))

Each event is a dict with event (str) and ts (Unix timestamp). Additional fields vary by event:

Event	Extra Fields	Notes
started	url	Before fetch begins
loading_strategy	url, strategy, attempt, max_retries, timeout	Per strategy attempt
retry	url, attempt, max_retries	When another attempt follows
page_loaded	url, completed, total, status_code	Success or error status
error	url, message	Unhandled exception
batch_started	total, to_fetch, cached	scrape_many only
batch_done	total	scrape_many only
browser_ready	browser	First-run browser check
browser_installing	browser	First-run install

ScraperDefaults

Global defaults, modifiable at runtime:

from ghostscraper import ScraperDefaults

ScraperDefaults.BROWSER_TYPE = "chromium"
ScraperDefaults.HEADLESS = True
ScraperDefaults.LOAD_TIMEOUT = 20000            # ms
ScraperDefaults.NETWORK_IDLE_TIMEOUT = 3000     # ms
ScraperDefaults.LOAD_STRATEGIES = ["load", "networkidle", "domcontentloaded"]
ScraperDefaults.MAX_RETRIES = 3
ScraperDefaults.BACKOFF_FACTOR = 2.0
ScraperDefaults.MAX_CONCURRENT = 15
ScraperDefaults.CACHE_TTL = 999                 # days
ScraperDefaults.CACHE_DIRECTORY = "data/ghostscraper"
ScraperDefaults.DYNAMODB_TABLE = None
ScraperDefaults.BROWSER_RESTART_EVERY = None
ScraperDefaults.PROXY = None                    # e.g. "socks5://localhost:1080"
ScraperDefaults.LOGGING = True

# Stream settings
ScraperDefaults.MAX_WORKERS = 2                 # concurrent subprocess workers
ScraperDefaults.SUBPROCESS_BATCH_SIZE = 50      # URLs per subprocess
ScraperDefaults.MAX_QUEUE_SIZE = 500            # max pending chunks in queue
ScraperDefaults.DEFAULT_PRIORITY = 5            # default stream priority (0–10)

PlaywrightScraper

Low-level browser automation used internally. Use directly only for raw browser control.

async with PlaywrightScraper(logging=False) as browser:
    html, status, headers, chain = await browser.fetch_url("https://example.com")
    body, status, headers = await browser.fetch_bytes("https://example.com/image.jpg")

Method	Returns	Description
await fetch()	(html, status, headers, chain)	Fetch self.url
await fetch_url(url)	(html, status, headers, chain)	Fetch specific URL
await fetch_many(urls, max_concurrent=5)	list[tuple]	Parallel fetch
await fetch_and_close()	(html, status, headers, chain)	Fetch and close browser
await fetch_bytes(url)	(bytes, status, headers)	Raw bytes fetch
await close()	None	Close browser
await check_and_install_browser()	bool	Check/install browser

Supports async with context manager.

Dependencies

• playwright
• beautifulsoup4
• html2text
• newspaper4k
• python-slugify
• logorator
• dynamorator
• lxml_html_clean

License

MIT. Contributions welcome: https://github.com/Redundando/ghostscraper