4 htsn-import \- Import XML files from The Sports Network into an RDBMS.
8 \fBhtsn-import\fR [OPTIONS] [FILES]
12 The Sports Network <http://www.sportsnetwork.com/> offers an XML feed
13 containing various sports news and statistics. Our sister program
14 \fBhtsn\fR is capable of retrieving the feed and saving the individual
15 XML documents contained therein. But what to do with them?
17 The purpose of \fBhtsn-import\fR is to take these XML documents and
18 get them into something we can use, a relational database management
19 system (RDBMS), otherwise known as a SQL database. The structure of
20 relational database, is, well, relational, and the feed XML is not. So
21 there is some work to do before the data can be imported into the
24 First, we must parse the XML. Each supported document type (see below)
25 has a full pickle/unpickle implementation (\(dqpickle\(dq is simply a
26 synonym for serialize here). That means that we parse the entire
27 document into a data structure, and if we pickle (serialize) that data
28 structure, we get the exact same XML document tha we started with.
30 This is important for two reasons. First, it serves as a second level
31 of validation. The first validation is performed by the XML parser,
32 but if that succeeds and unpicking fails, we know that something is
33 fishy. Second, we don't ever want to be surprised by some new element
34 or attribute showing up in the XML. The fact that we can unpickle the
35 whole thing now means that we won't be surprised in the future.
37 The aforementioned feature is especially important because we
38 automatically migrate the database schema every time we import a
39 document. If you attempt to import a \(dqnewsxml.dtd\(dq document, all
40 database objects relating to the news will be created if they do not
41 exist. We don't want the schema to change out from under us without
42 warning, so it's important that no XML be parsed that would result in
43 a different schema than we had previously. Since we can
44 pickle/unpickle everything already, this should be impossible.
46 .SH SUPPORTED DOCUMENT TYPES
48 The XML document types obtained from the feed are uniquely identified
49 by their DTDs. We currently support documents with the following DTDs:
51 AutoRacingResultsXML.dtd
53 Auto_Racing_Schedule_XML.dtd
57 Injuries_Detail_XML.dtd
78 Matchup_NBA_NHL_XML.dtd
80 MLB_Gaming_Matchup_XML.dtd
90 NBA_Gaming_Matchup_XML.dtd
92 NBA_Playoff_Matchup_XML.dtd
98 NCAA_FB_Preview_XML.dtd
100 NFL_NCAA_FB_Matchup_XML.dtd
108 WorldBaseballPreviewXML.dtd
116 Cbask_All_Tourn_Teams_XML.dtd
124 Cbask_Conf_Standings_XML.dtd
126 Cbask_DivII_III_Indv_Stats_XML.dtd
128 Cbask_DivII_Team_Stats_XML.dtd
130 Cbask_DivIII_Team_Stats_XML.dtd
138 Cbask_Indv_Scoring_XML.dtd
144 CBASK_ReboundsXML.dtd
146 CBASK_ScoringLeadersXML.dtd
148 Cbask_Team_ThreePT_Made_XML.dtd
150 Cbask_Team_ThreePT_PCT_XML.dtd
152 Cbask_Team_Win_Pct_XML.dtd
154 Cbask_Top_Twenty_Five_XML.dtd
157 The GameInfo and SportInfo types do not have their own top-level
158 tables in the database. Instead, their raw XML is stored in either the
159 \(dqgame_info\(dq or \(dqsport_info\(dq table respectively.
163 At the top level (with two notable exceptions), we have one table for
164 each of the XML document types that we import. For example, the
165 documents corresponding to \fInewsxml.dtd\fR will have a table called
166 \(dqnews\(dq. All top-level tables contain two important fields,
167 \(dqxml_file_id\(dq and \(dqtime_stamp\(dq. The former is unique and
168 prevents us from inserting the same data twice. The time stamp on the
169 other hand lets us know when the data is old and can be removed. The
170 database schema make it possible to delete only the outdated top-level
171 records; all transient children should be removed by triggers.
173 These top-level tables will often have children. For example, each
174 news item has zero or more locations associated with it. The child
175 table will be named <parent>_<children>, which in this case
176 corresponds to \(dqnews_locations\(dq.
178 To relate the two, a third table may exist with name
179 <parent>__<child>. Note the two underscores. This prevents ambiguity
180 when the child table itself contains underscores. The table joining
181 \(dqnews\(dq with \(dqnews_locations\(dq is thus called
182 \(dqnews__news_locations\(dq. This is necessary when the child table
183 has a unique constraint; we don't want to blindly insert duplicate
184 records keyed to the parent. Instead we'd like to use the third table
185 to map an existing child to the new parent.
187 Where it makes sense, children are kept unique to prevent pointless
188 duplication. This slows down inserts, and speeds up reads (which are
189 much more frequent). There is a tradeoff to be made, however. For a
190 table with a small, fixed upper bound on the number of rows (like
191 \(dqodds_casinos\(dq), there is great benefit to de-duplication. The
192 total number of rows stays small, so inserts are still quick, and many
193 duplicate rows are eliminated.
195 But, with a table like \(dqodds_games\(dq, the number of games grows
196 quickly and without bound. It is therefore more beneficial to be able
197 to delete the old games (through an ON DELETE CASCADE, tied to
198 \(dqodds\(dq) than it is to eliminate duplication. A table like
199 \(dqnews_locations\(dq is somewhere in-between. It is hoped that the
200 unique constraint in the top-level table's \(dqxml_file_id\(dq will
201 prevent duplication in this case anyway.
203 The aforementioned exceptions are the \(dqgame_info\(dq and
204 \(dqsport_info\(dq tables. These tables contain the raw XML for a
205 number of DTDs that are not handled individually. This is partially
206 for backwards-compatibility with a legacy implementation, but is
207 mostly a stopgap due to a lack of resources at the moment. These two
208 tables (game_info and sport_info) still possess timestamps that allow
209 us to prune old data.
211 UML diagrams of the resulting database schema for each XML document
212 type are provided with the \fBhtsn-import\fR documentation.
214 .SH XML Schema Oddities
216 There are a number of problems with the XML on the wire. Even if we
217 construct the DTDs ourselves, the results are sometimes
218 inconsistent. Here we document a few of them.
223 The <Notes> elements here are supposed to be associated with a set of
224 <Game> elements, but since the pair
225 (<Notes>...</Notes><Game>...</Game>) can appear zero or more times,
226 this leads to ambiguity in parsing. We therefore ignore the notes
227 entirely (although a hack is employed to facilitate parsing).
232 There appear to be two types of weather documents; the first has
233 <listing> contained within <forecast> and the second has <forecast>
234 contained within <listing>. While it would be possible to parse both,
235 it would greatly complicate things. The first form is more common, so
236 that's all we support for now.
240 .IP \fB\-\-backend\fR,\ \fB\-b\fR
241 The RDBMS backend to use. Valid choices are \fISqlite\fR and
242 \fIPostgres\fR. Capitalization is important, sorry.
246 .IP \fB\-\-connection-string\fR,\ \fB\-c\fR
247 The connection string used for connecting to the database backend
248 given by the \fB\-\-backend\fR option. The default is appropriate for
249 the \fISqlite\fR backend.
251 Default: \(dq:memory:\(dq
253 .IP \fB\-\-log-file\fR
254 If you specify a file here, logs will be written to it (possibly in
255 addition to syslog). Can be either a relative or absolute path. It
256 will not be auto-rotated; use something like logrotate for that.
260 .IP \fB\-\-log-level\fR
261 How verbose should the logs be? We log notifications at four levels:
262 DEBUG, INFO, WARN, and ERROR. Specify the \(dqmost boring\(dq level of
263 notifications you would like to receive (in all-caps); more
264 interesting notifications will be logged as well. The debug output is
265 extremely verbose and will not be written to syslog even if you try.
269 .IP \fB\-\-remove\fR,\ \fB\-r\fR
270 Remove successfully processed files. If you enable this, you can see
271 at a glance which XML files are not being processed, because they're
272 all that should be left.
276 .IP \fB\-\-syslog\fR,\ \fB\-s\fR
277 Enable logging to syslog. On Windows this will attempt to communicate
278 (over UDP) with a syslog daemon on localhost, which will most likely
283 .SH CONFIGURATION FILE
285 Any of the command-line options mentioned above can be specified in a
286 configuration file instead. We first look for \(dqhtsn-importrc\(dq in
287 the system configuration directory. We then look for a file named
288 \(dq.htsn-importrc\(dq in the user's home directory. The latter will
291 The user's home directory is simply $HOME on Unix; on Windows it's
292 wherever %APPDATA% points. The system configuration directory is
293 determined by Cabal; the \(dqsysconfdir\(dq parameter during the
294 \(dqconfigure\(dq step is used.
296 The file's syntax is given by examples in the htsn-importrc.example file
297 (included with \fBhtsn-import\fR).
299 Options specified on the command-line override those in either
304 Import newsxml.xml into a preexisting sqlite database named \(dqfoo.sqlite3\(dq:
307 .I $ htsn-import --connection-string='foo.sqlite3' \\\\
308 .I " test/xml/newsxml.xml"
309 Successfully imported test/xml/newsxml.xml.
310 Imported 1 document(s) total.
313 Repeat the previous example, but delete newsxml.xml afterwards:
316 .I $ htsn-import --connection-string='foo.sqlite3' \\\\
317 .I " --remove test/xml/newsxml.xml"
318 Successfully imported test/xml/newsxml.xml.
319 Imported 1 document(s) total.
320 Removed processed file test/xml/newsxml.xml.
323 Use a Postgres database instead of the default Sqlite. This assumes
324 that you have a database named \(dqhtsn\(dq accessible to user
325 \(dqpostgres\(dq locally:
328 .I $ htsn-import --connection-string='dbname=htsn user=postgres' \\\\
329 .I " --backend=Postgres test/xml/newsxml.xml"
330 Successfully imported test/xml/newsxml.xml.
331 Imported 1 document(s) total.
337 Send bugs to michael@orlitzky.com.