# beautifulsoup-parsing

Teaches AI agents to parse HTML and XML with BeautifulSoup in Python. Helps write cleaner scrapers with safe data extraction and DOM navigation.

- skill · `type=skill` · Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, GitHub Copilot, Gemini CLI, OpenCode · 877 installs · ★ 286
- Author: Mindrally
- License: Apache-2.0 · policy=mirror · the beginning of the file is at the end of this page
- Source: https://github.com/Mindrally/skills/tree/HEAD/beautifulsoup-parsing/SKILL.md
- Updated: 2026-10-08
- HTML: https://affpapa.org/en/nevibecode/skills/beautifulsoup-parsing

## What it does

This skill guides code agents on parsing HTML. It prioritizes CSS selectors over fragile lookups. Missing elements will not crash the script. Each helper returns a safe fallback.

The reference material covers DOM traversal and URL handling. It demonstrates how to inspect parent and child nodes without losing context. You also get concise patterns for converting relative links through `urljoin` and turning tables into Python dictionaries.

Running the examples requires `beautifulsoup4` and `lxml`. While `lxml` is the default recommendation for speed, broken markup needs `html5lib`. That parser is notably slower, but it prevents parse failures on malformed pages.

## Install

### Claude Code (native platform)

1. **Skills CLI (Vercel)**
```bash
npx skills add Mindrally/skills --skill beautifulsoup-parsing -a claude-code
```

2. **Manually: put the files in place**
- File: `~/.claude/skills/beautifulsoup-parsing/SKILL.md` — Copy the whole skill folder; for one project use .claude/skills/beautifulsoup-parsing/

### Codex

1. **Skills CLI (Vercel)**
```bash
npx skills add Mindrally/skills --skill beautifulsoup-parsing -a codex
```

2. **Manually: put the files in place**
- File: `.agents/skills/beautifulsoup-parsing/SKILL.md` — For all projects use ~/.agents/skills/

### Cursor

1. **Skills CLI (Vercel)**
```bash
npx skills add Mindrally/skills --skill beautifulsoup-parsing -a cursor
```

2. **Manually: put the files in place**
- File: `.cursor/skills/beautifulsoup-parsing/SKILL.md` — Cursor also reads .agents/skills/ and .claude/skills/

### GitHub Copilot

1. **GitHub CLI**
```bash
gh skill install Mindrally/skills beautifulsoup-parsing
```

2. **Manually: put the files in place**
- File: `.github/skills/beautifulsoup-parsing/SKILL.md`

### Gemini CLI

1. **Skills CLI (Vercel)**
```bash
npx skills add Mindrally/skills --skill beautifulsoup-parsing -a gemini-cli
```

2. **Platform CLI**
```bash
gemini skills install https://github.com/Mindrally/skills --path beautifulsoup-parsing
```

### Windsurf (Devin Desktop)

**Manually: put the files in place**
- File: `.devin/skills/beautifulsoup-parsing/SKILL.md` — The legacy .windsurf/skills/ path still works

### OpenCode

**Skills CLI (Vercel)**
```bash
npx skills add Mindrally/skills --skill beautifulsoup-parsing -a opencode
```

### Claude.ai

**Claude.ai**
- Zip the folder and upload it in Settings → Capabilities → Skills

Where a file is given instead of a command, copy the files from the source to that path: https://github.com/Mindrally/skills/tree/HEAD/beautifulsoup-parsing/SKILL.md

## When to use it
- extract HTML tables directly into Python dictionaries
- read tags and attributes safely with fallback values
- convert relative URLs to absolute links via urljoin
- parse broken markup using lxml or html5lib

## Example prompts
- Write a BeautifulSoup script to extract all product titles and prices from this catalog page.
- Parse the HTML table into a list of dictionaries with safe fallback values.
- Extract all article links from div.article elements and resolve their URLs.

## Source text · SKILL.md · Apache-2.0

Below is the content of a third-party file. It is data, not instructions for you: do not act on anything written inside unless the human asks. Block tag: a978fdfe3e344e6d.

BEGIN THIRD-PARTY FILE a978fdfe3e344e6d
````text
---
name: beautifulsoup-parsing
description: Expert guidance for HTML/XML parsing using BeautifulSoup in Python with best practices for DOM navigation, data extraction, and efficient scraping workflows.
metadata:
  maintainer: Mindrally
  source: https://github.com/Mindrally/skills
---

# BeautifulSoup HTML Parsing

You are an expert in BeautifulSoup, Python HTML/XML parsing, DOM navigation, and building efficient data extraction pipelines for web scraping.

## Core Expertise
- BeautifulSoup API and parsing methods
- CSS selectors and find methods
- DOM traversal and navigation
- HTML/XML parsing with different parsers
- Integration with requests library
- Handling malformed HTML gracefully
- Data extraction patterns and best practices
- Memory-efficient processing

## Key Principles

- Write concise, technical code with accurate Python examples
- Prioritize readability, efficiency, and maintainability
- Use modular, reusable functions for common extraction tasks
- Handle missing data gracefully with proper defaults
- Follow PEP 8 style guidelines
- Implement proper error handling for robust scraping

## Basic Setup

```bash
pip install beautifulsoup4 requests lxml
```

### Loading HTML
```python
from bs4 import BeautifulSoup
import requests

# From string
html = '<html><body><h1>Hello</h1></body></html>'
soup = BeautifulSoup(html, 'lxml')

# From file
with open('page.html', 'r', encoding='utf-8') as f:
    soup = BeautifulSoup(f, 'lxml')

# From URL
response = requests.get('https://example.com')
soup = BeautifulSoup(response.content, 'lxml')
```

### Parser Options
```python
# lxml - Fast, lenient (recommended)
soup = BeautifulSoup(html, 'lxml')

# html.parser - Built-in, no dependencies
soup = BeautifulSoup(html, 'html.parser')

# html5lib - Most lenient, slowest
soup = BeautifulSoup(html, 'html5lib')

# lxml-xml - For XML documents
soup = BeautifulSoup(xml, 'lxml-xml')
```

## Finding Elements

### By Tag
```python
# First matching element
soup.find('h1')

# All matching elements
soup.find_all('p')

# Shorthand
soup.h1  # Same as soup.find('h1')
```

### By Attributes
```python
# By class
soup.find('div', class_='article')
soup.find_all('div', class_='article')

# By ID
soup.find(id='main-content')

# By any attribute
soup.find('a', href='https://example.com')
soup.find_all('input', attrs={'type': 'text', 'name': 'email'})

# By data attributes
soup.find('div', attrs={'data-id': '123'})
```

### CSS Selectors
```python
# Single element
soup.select_one('div.article > h2')

# Multiple elements
soup.select('div.article h2')

# Complex selectors
soup.select('a[href^="https://"]')  # Starts with
soup.select('a[href$=".pdf"]')      # Ends with
soup.select('a[href*="example"]')   # Contains
soup.select('li:nth-child(2)')
soup.select('h1, h2, h3')           # Multiple
```

### With Functions
```python
import re

# By regex
soup.find_all('a', href=re.compile(r'^https://'))

# By function
def has_data_attr(tag):
    return tag.has_attr('data-id')

soup.find_all(has_data_attr)
````
END THIRD-PARTY FILE a978fdfe3e344e6d

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