Why can't I fetch www.google.com with Perl's LWP::Simple?

Question

Hi, I cant seem to get this peice of code to work:

    $self->{_current_page} = $href;
    my $response = $ua->get($href);
    my $responseCode = $response->code;
    if( $responseCode ne "404" ) {
       my $content = LWP::Simple->get($href);
       die "get failed: " . $href if (!defined $content);
    }

Will return error: get failed: http://www.google.com

The full code is as follows:

#!/usr/bin/perl
use strict;
use URI;
use URI::http;
use File::Basename;
use DBI;
use LWP::Simple;
require LWP::UserAgent;
my $ua = LWP::UserAgent->new;
$ua->timeout(10);
$ua->env_proxy;
$ua->max_redirect(0);


package Crawler;
sub new {
    my $class = shift;
    my $self = {
        _url => shift,
        _max_link => 0,
        _local => 1
    };
    bless $self, $class;
    return $self;

}
sub trim{
    my( $self, $string ) = @_;
    $string =~ s/^\s+//;
    $string =~ s/\s+$//;
    return $string;
}
sub process_image {
    my ($self, $process_image) = @_;
    $self->{_process_image} = $process_image;
}
sub local {
    my ($self, $local) = @_;
    $self->{_local} = $local;
}
sub max_link {
    my ($self, $max_link) = @_;
    $self->{_max_link} = $max_link;
}
sub x_more {
    my ($self, $x_more) = @_;
    $self->{_x_more} = $x_more;
}
sub resolve_href {
    my ($base, $href) = @_;
    my $uri = URI->new($href);
    return $uri->rel($base);    
}
sub write {
    my ( $self, $ref, $data ) = @_;
    open FILE, '>c:/perlscripts/' . $ref . '_' . $self->{_process_image} . '.txt';
    foreach( $data ) {
        print FILE $self->trim($_) . "\n";
    }
    close( FILE );
}
sub scrape {
    my @m_error_array;
    my @m_href_array;
    my @href_array;
    my ( $self, $DBhost, $DBuser, $DBpass, $DBname ) = @_;
    my ($dbh, $query, $result, $array);
    my $DNS = "dbi:mysql:$DBname:$DBhost:3306";
    $dbh = DBI->connect($DNS, $DBuser, $DBpass ) or die $DBI::errstr;
    if( defined( $self->{_process_image} ) && ( -e 'c:/perlscripts/href_w_' . $self->{_process_image} . ".txt" ) ) {
        open  ERROR_W, "<c:/perlscripts/error_w_" . $self->{_process_image} . ".txt";
        open  M_HREF_W, "<c:/perlscripts/m_href_w_" . $self->{_process_image} . ".txt";
        open  HREF_W, "<c:/perlscripts/href_w_" . $self->{_process_image} . ".txt";
        @m_error_array = <ERROR_W>;
        @m_href_array = <M_HREF_W>;
        @href_array = <HREF_W>;
        close ( ERROR_W );
        close ( M_HREF_W );
        close ( HREF_W );
    }else{
        @href_array = ( $self->{_url} );
    }
    my $z = 0;
    while( @href_array ){
        if( defined( $self->{_x_more} ) && $z == $self->{_x_more} ) {
            last;
        }
        if( defined( $self->{_process_image} ) ) {
            $self->write( 'm_href_w', @m_href_array );
            $self->write( 'href_w', @href_array );
            $self->write( 'error_w', @m_error_array );
        }
        $self->{_link_count} = scalar @m_href_array;
        my $href = shift( @href_array );
        my $info = URI::http->new($href);
        my $host = $info->host;
        $host =~ s/^www\.//;
        $result = $dbh->prepare("INSERT INTO `". $host ."` (URL) VALUES ('$href')");
        if( ! $result->execute() ){
            $result = $dbh->prepare("CREATE TABLE `" . $host . "` ( `ID` INT( 255 ) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT , `URL` VARCHAR( 255 ) NOT NULL , PRIMARY KEY ( `ID` )) ENGINE = MYISAM ;");
            $result->execute();
        }
        $self->{_current_page} = $href;
        my $response = $ua->get($href);
        my $responseCode = $response->code;
        if( $responseCode ne "404" ) {
           my $content = LWP::Simple->get($href);
           die "get failed: " . $href if (!defined $content);
        }
        #print $responseCode;
    }
}
1;

#$query = "SELECT * FROM `actwebdesigns.co.uk` ORDER BY ID DESC";
#$result = $dbh->prepare($query);
#$result->execute();
#while( $array = $result->fetchrow_hashref() ) {
#    print $array->{'URL'} . "\n";
#}

EDIT:

Still not working with redirect fixed.

my $redirect_limit = 10;
    my $y = 0;
    while( 1 && $y le $redirect_limit ) {
        my $response = $ua->get($href);
        my $responseCode = $response->code;
        if( $responseCode == 200 || $responseCode == 301 || $responseCode == 302 ) {
            if( $responseCode == 301 || $responseCode == 302 ) {
                $href = $response->header('Location');
            }else{
                last;
            }
        }else{
            push( @m_error_array, $href );
            last;
        }
        $y++;
    }
    if( $y ne $redirect_limit ) {
        if( ! defined( $self->{_url_list} ) ) {
            my @url_list = ( $href );
        }else{
            my @url_list = $self->{_url_list};
            push( @url_list, $href );
            $self->{_url_list} = @url_list;
        }
        my $content = LWP::Simple->get($href);
        die "get failed: " . $href if (!defined $content);

        #$result = $dbh->prepare("INSERT INTO `". $host ."` (URL) VALUES ('$href')");
        #if( ! $result->execute() ){
        #    $result = $dbh->prepare("CREATE TABLE `" . $host . "` ( `ID` INT( 255 ) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT , `URL` VARCHAR( 255 ) NOT NULL , PRIMARY KEY ( `ID` )) ENGINE = MYISAM ;");
        #    $result->execute();
        #}
        print "good";
    }else{
        push( @m_error_array, $href );
    }

Answer 1

You should examine the response code to see what's happening (you're already checking for 404s). I get a 302 - a redirect.

For example:

die "get failed ($responseCode): " . $href if (!defined $content);

Resulting message:

get failed (302): http://www.google.com at goog.pl line 20.

Answer 2

A couple of thoughts.

1/ You seems to be using the string comparison operators (le, ne) to compare numbers. You should use the numeric comparison operators (<=, !=) instead.

2/ The value you get back from the LWP::UserAgent::get call is an HTTP::Response object. Judicious use of that class's "is_foo" method might make your code a bit cleaner.

I don't know if either of these will solve your problem. But they'll improve the quality of your code.

Answer 3

Here's your problem:

my $content = LWP::Simple->get($href);

That passes the string "LWP::Simple" as the first argument to 'get'. You want:

my $content = LWP::Simple::get($href);