Conference Check Script

This Python script checks if the websites for future tech conferences are live. It is designed to be run from a cron job. If a conference website is live, the script sends an email notification.

Requirements

• Python 3
• Requests library (pip install requests)

Usage

1. Clone the Git repository containing the script:

   git clone https://git.4angle.com/edward/conference-check.git conference-check
   

2. Modify the conferences list in the script to include the conferences you want to monitor. Each entry should be a tuple containing the conference name and its URL.

3. Configure the email settings in the script:

   • MAIL_FROM: The email address from which notifications will be sent.
   • MAIL_TO_NAME: The recipient's name.
   • MAIL_TO_ADDRESS: The recipient's email address.
   • SMTP_HOST: The SMTP server hostname.

4. Set up a cron job to run the script periodically. For example, to run it every hour:

   0 * * * * /usr/bin/python3 /path/to/conference-check/check.py
   

Script Description

• The script uses the requests library to make HTTP requests to the conference websites.

• It checks for specific messages in the website content to determine if the website is not live (e.g., "404 Not Found" or "500 Internal Server Error").

• If a conference website is live, the script extracts the web page title and sends an email notification with the conference details.

Customization

You can customize the script further by modifying the following:

• not_here_list: Add or remove messages that indicate the website is not live.
• AGENT and headers: Modify the user-agent and headers used for HTTP requests.

How to Run

To execute the script manually, run the following command:

/usr/bin/python3 /path/to/conference-check/check.py

Example

To add a conference to the conferences list, use the following format:

("Example Conference", "https://example-conference.com/2024/")

License

This script is provided under the MIT License. You can find the full license text in the LICENSE file.

Author

Edward Betts (Contact: edward@4angle.com)