Extracting Data from FRC-Spy

Technical Website Design/Showcase
1

Hi everyone,
I want to use the xml data from FRC-Spy to automatically update match results on our team website. My issue is I don’t know how to extract the xml data from FRC-Spy. I know you should be able to add “xml=2” to the end of the address to get all the match results in xml, but I can’t manage to get the actual information off the website. I’m using php with simple xml.
So far this is what I’m having trouble with:

$allmatches = simplexml_load_file("http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/frcspy.php?xml=2.xml");

This never actually loads the file so that I can use it. The server is running php 5.2.17.

Any suggestions or example code would be great, since I am pretty new to php.
Also, if I need to clarify anything, let me know.

2

The main problem is with your URL. ‘?xml=2.xml’ should just be ‘?xml=2’.

You can also add ‘&teams=4096’ after the 2 to filter to a specific team.

Here’s some sample code and a demo that (I think) provides the information you’re looking for.

Demo - I use team 27, since your team has no results in FRC-Spy yet - http://keatonismy.name/dev/frcspy.php

Code:

<?php
//$allmatches = simplexml_load_file("http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/frcspy.php?xml=2&teams=4096");  
$allmatches = simplexml_load_file("http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/frcspy.php?xml=2&teams=27");  


//print_r($allmatches);


$i = 0;
foreach ($allmatches as $row){
echo "<b>Event: </b>" . $allmatches->match$i]->event . "<br />";
echo "<b>Match Type: </b>" . $allmatches->match$i]->typ . "<br />";
echo "<b>Match No.: </b>" . $allmatches->match$i]->mch . "<br />";
echo "<b>Red 1: </b>" . $allmatches->match$i]->red1 . "  ";
echo "<b>Red 2: </b>" . $allmatches->match$i]->red2 . "  ";
echo "<b>Red 3: </b>" . $allmatches->match$i]->red3 . "  <br />";
echo "<b>Blue 1: </b>" . $allmatches->match$i]->blue1 . "  ";
echo "<b>Blue 2: </b>" . $allmatches->match$i]->blue2 . "  ";
echo "<b>Blue 3: </b>" . $allmatches->match$i]->blue3 . "  <br />";
echo "<b>Red Score: </b>" . $allmatches->match$i]->rfin . "  ";
echo "<b>Blue Score: </b>" . $allmatches->match$i]->bfin . "<br />";

echo "<br />";

$i++;
}

?>

If you uncomment the print_r line, you’ll see the raw XML for your query.

Also, unless you’re set on coding this from scratch yourself, team 862 has a nice system for retrieving match results with simple configuration. Check out http://lightningrobotics.com/Contents/index.php?pagename=lrmrrs and the CD thread http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/showthread.php?t=104249

3

Thank you so much! I figured I made some simple mistake, but that’s part of learning.

4

Actually, after more digging and debugging, my issue was that I can’t directly access external websites on this server (something like that). By using curl, my problem was solved. Thanks for the explanation on how to make FRC-spy filter by team, though.

5

Just a heads-up: Before you invest too much time in this, you might want to read these posts: