05.12.08

python amazon stock checker

Posted in Shopping, programming at 23:01 by dalore

I just wrote my first python program. It checks a given ASIN to see if amazon has it in stock.

#!/usr/bin/python

import sys
import urllib

AWSAccessKeyId = "removed"
AmazonMerchantId = "A3P5ROKL5A1OLE"

def checkStock(asin):
  try:
    fh = urllib.urlopen("http://ecs.amazonaws.co.uk/onca/xml?Service=AWSECommerceService&AWSAccessKeyId="+AWSAccessKeyId+"&Operation=ItemLookup&ItemId="+asin+"&ResponseGroup=OfferFull&Version=2008-04-07")
  except:
    print "fail"
    return -1
  page = fh.read()
  fh.close()
  found = page.find(AmazonMerchantId)
  return found != -1

try:
  asin = sys.argv[1]
except:
  print "Usage: " + sys.argv[0] + " asin"
else:
  if checkStock(asin):
    print "in stock"
  else:
    print "not in stock"

You of course need to sign up to amazon webservices and insert your own AWS access key.

Sample output:

# Mario Kart (Wii)
./stockcheck.py B000XJNTNS
not in stock

# Nintendo Wii Console
./stockcheck.py B0007UATDG
in stock


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