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A comment on I miss the programmable web (2021). Parent comment

Re:I miss the programmable web (2021) by Kye on Saturday July 30, 2022 @07:53AM (#32286095)
There were these things called API spies back in the VB6 days that would figure out the appropriate way to refer to whatever you clicked. The one from PatorJK would even produce code to do things to it from downloadable templates.

It's still around: https://patorjk.com/blog/software/

I wonder why no one ever made something like this for the web.

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Re:I miss the programmable web (2021) by LamaOfRuin on Saturday July 30, 2022 @09:41AM (#32286748)
It is built into every browser's dev tools, but the point GP was making is that the way many websites are built now means that for an external observer, the way you refer to an element changes with every reload, or with every new build (which may happen at any time and frequently for actively developed sites).
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