WWW::Myspace - Access MySpace.com from Perl scripts

WWW::Myspace.pm provides methods to access myspace.com accounts and functions
automatically. It provides a simple interface for scripts to log in,
access lists of friends, scan user's profiles, retreive profile
data, and post comments.

Example:

    use WWW::Myspace;
    my $myspace = WWW::Myspace->new ($account, $password);
        OR
    my $myspace = new WWW::Myspace; # Prompts for email and password

    my ( @friends ) = $myspace->get_friends();


PREREQUESITES

HTTP::Request::Form
Spiffy

Each of them has a list of dependencies also.

If you don't have XML::Parser installed,
you'll probably need to manually install expat:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/expat/

On MacOS X you'll need to install the developer tools from your
Tiger install DVD or download them from http://developer.apple.com
or nothing will install and you'll get errors about missing CORE files).
(I haven't tested this on pre-Tiger MacOS, but it should work).

INSTALLATION

Installing using the cpan command-line tool is the easiest
as it will install the dependencies for you.

cpan install WWW::Myspace

or

sudo cpan install WWW::Myspace

Good general advice for installing any CPAN module:
If a module fails to install:
- Starting at the top, scan the copious output cpan will create
- When you see a module has failed to install:
  - cd into the module's directory ( hint: cd ~/.cpan/build ; ls )
  - Read the README for the module and install it manually. You'll
    see the specific errors it's having there.
  - Once it's installed, run your cpan install command again.

If you don't configure cpan to use "sudo make install"
(and you should, for which you'll need cpan 1.83), you'll probably
want to run the cpan command as root or run "sudo cpan". man cpan
for more info.


To install this module manually, run the following commands:

    perl Makefile.PL
    make
    make test
    sudo make install  # Or su root ; make install


The distribution also installs the following convenience modules:
WWW::Myspace::Comment
WWW::Myspace::FriendChanges
WWW::Myspace::Message

The distribution also installs the following handy scripts:
comment_myspace
message_group
approve_friends

These are scripts I use, and decided to include in the
distribution in case they're handy, since they're the most common
uses for the module, and they're a bit more robust and friendly
than just using the methods in the module themselves.


TEST SUITE

WWW::Myspace accesses a web site, which by nature may change.
Such change may break functions in this module.
The test suite (run during cpan installation or when you type
"make test") runs an extensive battery of tests on all methods
against the myspace site. This has a few effects:
1) It makes sure the module works on your system.
2) It makes sure that the module works with the current version
   of the myspace site.
3) If the site changes, or has problems, tests may fail even though
   overall the module will work.
My approach to programming is that the module should be robust
enough to handle the changes in the myspace site, so if condition
3 occurs, the module needs beefing up.

Note that you can re-run the test suite at any time. Keep a copy
of the distribution (hint: cd ~/.cpan/build/WWW-Myspace* ) and
run:
    perl Makefile.PL
    make test

This is handy if you find that something in one of your scripts
stops working and you're wondering if something changed that broke
WWW::Myspace. If the tests pass, it's probably your script. If not,
there'll probably be an update coming soon (make sure you have
the latest version, of course - just re-run the cpan command).


SUPPORT AND DOCUMENTATION

After installing, you can find documentation for this module with
the perldoc command.

  perldoc WWW::Myspace

You can also look for information at:

    Search CPAN
        http://search.cpan.org/dist/WWW-Myspace

    CPAN Request Tracker:
        http://rt.cpan.org/NoAuth/Bugs.html?Dist=WWW-Myspace

    AnnoCPAN, annotated CPAN documentation:
        http://annocpan.org/dist/WWW-Myspace

    CPAN Ratings:
        http://cpanratings.perl.org/d/WWW-Myspace

COPYRIGHT AND LICENCE

Copyright (C) 2005 Grant Grueninger

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
under the same terms as Perl itself.