OxyCast

Machine Learning (ML) is a powerful technology implemented in various fields. Web scraping isn't any exception – with the use of machine learning, public data gathering projects can become more efficient. Of course, machine learning isn't an easy nut to crack. This is the reason why our host, Augustinas Kalvis, has brought a very special guest with him, Jurijus Gorskovas, a Machine Learning Engineer at Oxylabs. If you want to understand better how machine learning can help you gather structured public information or how to try to develop a machine learning model yourself, the #6 episode of OxyCast has it covered.

In this episode, you'll learn:

• Challenges of finding a job in the machine learning field
• Why is machine learning an exciting field to work in?
• What is a Universal E-Commerce Parser, and how does it work?
• Explanation of the "feature" in machine learning
• Basics of a machine learning model
• Delving deeper to understand "features" even more
• What problems can be solved with machine learning?

*Information provided in this episode is based on our clients' use of Oxylabs' innovative solutions and tools for scraping publicly available data.

Curious to learn what proxies are and how they’re used for web scraping? In the fifth episode of OxyCast, OxyCast host and Software Engineer Augustinas Kalvis and Mindaugas Dunderis discuss proxies and how they go hand-in-hand with public data scraping.

Mindaugas gives his professional insight into the importance of getting proxies from a reputable provider rather than using free ones. He also shares how Residential Proxies are acquired, how they compare against Datacenter Proxies, and which one suits better for different business cases.

In this video, you’ll learn:

• Proxy definition
• Proxies for web scraping
• Are free proxies safe to use?
• Why should you pay for proxies instead of using free ones?
• Proxy locations
• How do Residential Proxies work, and how are they acquired?
• Residential vs. Datacenter Proxies: different use cases
• Oxylabs’ innovations in the proxy industry

*Information provided in this episode is based on our clients' use of Oxylabs' innovative solutions and tools for scraping publicly available data.

In the 4th episode of OxyCast, our host- Augustinas Kalvis, along with the special guest who has been at Oxylabs since the very beginning, Eivydas Vilčinskas (Tech Team Lead), discuss the ever-complex yet always relevant topic of scaling. From the explanation of what scaling is and why it’s essential to its unique intricacies, difficulties, and viable approaches, this episode looks at all of it!*

In this episode you’ll learn:

• How do you go from 10 requests per second to tens of thousands?
• How do you ensure various bottlenecks are solved, and where might they appear in the first place?
• Infrastructure and application bottlenecks, when do you encounter them, and what are some of the solutions you could use?
• Vertical vs. Horizontal scaling, what are their differences, and when to use which?
• Load balancers, how do they help?
• And a multitude of other questions will be answered!

In the #3 episode of OxyCast, the host, Augustinas Kalvis, and a special guest – Povilas Kudriavcevas (both are Software Engineers at Oxylabs), will discuss data parsing basics and go through the easy and the difficult parts of the process. Augustinas and Povilas will also explain how to parse an item and speculate what may be the future of data parsing.*

In this podcast episode, you’ll learn:

• What the process of parsing an item is like
• Writing a good selector
• How to monitor a parser
• Practices of testing a parser
• Making the parser scalable
• How to handle constant website layout changes

*Information provided in this episode is based on our clients’ use of Oxylabs’ innovative solutions and tools for scraping publicly available data.

In the #2 episode of OxyCast, the host – Augustinas Kalvis (Software Developer at Oxylabs), and his special guest – Martynas Saulius (Python Developer at Oxylabs), explain the blocking process in-depth and what daily web scraping challenges even skilled developers encounter, and how to avoid them.*

In this episode you’ll learn:

• Why is it essential to ensure web scraper’s reliability and scalability? How to do it?
• How do websites detect bots?
• What happens when you get blocked?
• Which web scraping blocking methods are encountered most?
• What are the most common ways to mitigate the blocking?

In the #1 episode of OxyCast, the host – Augustinas Kalvis (Software Developer at Oxylabs), and the first guest – Aleksandras Šulženko (Product Owner at Oxylabs), discusses:

• Why do we need web scraping?
• What are the most commonly used definitions in web scraping?
• What do people do with scraped data?
• Why buy a scraper if you can build one?
• How difficult is web scraping actually?