NAME
    WWW::Mechanize - Handy web browsing in a Perl object

VERSION
    version 1.80

SYNOPSIS
    "WWW::Mechanize", or Mech for short, is a Perl module for stateful
    programmatic web browsing, used for automating interaction with
    websites.

    Features include:

    *   All HTTP methods

    *   High-level hyperlink and HTML form support, without having to parse
        HTML yourself

    *   SSL support

    *   Automatic cookies

    *   Custom HTTP headers

    *   Automatic handling of redirections

    *   Proxies

    *   HTTP authentication

    Mech supports performing a sequence of page fetches including following
    links and submitting forms. Each fetched page is parsed and its links
    and forms are extracted. A link or a form can be selected, form fields
    can be filled and the next page can be fetched. Mech also stores a
    history of the URLs you've visited, which can be queried and revisited.

        use WWW::Mechanize;
        my $mech = WWW::Mechanize->new();

        $mech->get( $url );

        $mech->follow_link( n => 3 );
        $mech->follow_link( text_regex => qr/download this/i );
        $mech->follow_link( url => 'http://host.com/index.html' );

        $mech->submit_form(
            form_number => 3,
            fields      => {
                username    => 'mungo',
                password    => 'lost-and-alone',
            }
        );

        $mech->submit_form(
            form_name => 'search',
            fields    => { query  => 'pot of gold', },
            button    => 'Search Now'
        );

    Mech is well suited for use in testing web applications. If you use one
    of the Test::*, like Test::HTML::Lint modules, you can check the fetched
    content and use that as input to a test call.

        use Test::More;
        like( $mech->content(), qr/$expected/, "Got expected content" );

    Each page fetch stores its URL in a history stack which you can
    traverse.

        $mech->back();

    If you want finer control over your page fetching, you can use these
    methods. "follow_link" and "submit_form" are just high level wrappers
    around them.

        $mech->find_link( n => $number );
        $mech->form_number( $number );
        $mech->form_name( $name );
        $mech->field( $name, $value );
        $mech->set_fields( %field_values );
        $mech->set_visible( @criteria );
        $mech->click( $button );

    WWW::Mechanize is a proper subclass of LWP::UserAgent and you can also
    use any of LWP::UserAgent's methods.

        $mech->add_header($name => $value);

    Please note that Mech does NOT support JavaScript, you need additional
    software for that. Please check "JavaScript" in WWW::Mechanize::FAQ for
    more.

IMPORTANT LINKS
    *   <https://github.com/libwww-perl/WWW-Mechanize/issues>

        The queue for bugs & enhancements in WWW::Mechanize and
        Test::WWW::Mechanize. Please note that the queue at
        <http://rt.cpan.org> is no longer maintained.

    *   <http://search.cpan.org/dist/WWW-Mechanize/>

        The CPAN documentation page for Mechanize.

    *   <http://search.cpan.org/dist/WWW-Mechanize/lib/WWW/Mechanize/FAQ.pod
        >

        Frequently asked questions. Make sure you read here FIRST.

CONSTRUCTOR AND STARTUP
  new()
    Creates and returns a new WWW::Mechanize object, hereafter referred to
    as the "agent".

        my $mech = WWW::Mechanize->new()

    The constructor for WWW::Mechanize overrides two of the parms to the
    LWP::UserAgent constructor:

        agent => 'WWW-Mechanize/#.##'
        cookie_jar => {}    # an empty, memory-only HTTP::Cookies object

    You can override these overrides by passing parms to the constructor, as
    in:

        my $mech = WWW::Mechanize->new( agent => 'wonderbot 1.01' );

    If you want none of the overhead of a cookie jar, or don't want your bot
    accepting cookies, you have to explicitly disallow it, like so:

        my $mech = WWW::Mechanize->new( cookie_jar => undef );

    Here are the parms that WWW::Mechanize recognizes. These do not include
    parms that LWP::UserAgent recognizes.

    *   "autocheck => [0|1]"

        Checks each request made to see if it was successful. This saves you
        the trouble of manually checking yourself. Any errors found are
        errors, not warnings.

        The default value is ON, unless it's being subclassed, in which case
        it is OFF. This means that standalone WWW::Mechanizeinstances have
        autocheck turned on, which is protective for the vast majority of
        Mech users who don't bother checking the return value of get() and
        post() and can't figure why their code fails. However, if
        WWW::Mechanize is subclassed, such as for Test::WWW::Mechanize or
        Test::WWW::Mechanize::Catalyst, this may not be an appropriate
        default, so it's off.

    *   "noproxy => [0|1]"

        Turn off the automatic call to the LWP::UserAgent "env_proxy"
        function.

        This needs to be explicitly turned off if you're using Crypt::SSLeay
        to access a https site via a proxy server. Note: you still need to
        set your HTTPS_PROXY environment variable as appropriate.

    *   "onwarn => \&func"

        Reference to a "warn"-compatible function, such as "Carp::carp",
        that is called when a warning needs to be shown.

        If this is set to "undef", no warnings will ever be shown. However,
        it's probably better to use the "quiet" method to control that
        behavior.

        If this value is not passed, Mech uses "Carp::carp" if Carp is
        installed, or "CORE::warn" if not.

    *   "onerror => \&func"

        Reference to a "die"-compatible function, such as "Carp::croak",
        that is called when there's a fatal error.

        If this is set to "undef", no errors will ever be shown.

        If this value is not passed, Mech uses "Carp::croak" if Carp is
        installed, or "CORE::die" if not.

    *   "quiet => [0|1]"

        Don't complain on warnings. Setting "quiet => 1" is the same as
        calling "$mech->quiet(1)". Default is off.

    *   "stack_depth => $value"

        Sets the depth of the page stack that keeps track of all the
        downloaded pages. Default is effectively infinite stack size. If the
        stack is eating up your memory, then set this to a smaller number,
        say 5 or 10. Setting this to zero means Mech will keep no history.

    To support forms, WWW::Mechanize's constructor pushes POST on to the
    agent's "requests_redirectable" list (see also LWP::UserAgent.)

  $mech->agent_alias( $alias )
    Sets the user agent string to the expanded version from a table of
    actual user strings. *$alias* can be one of the following:

    *   Windows IE 6

    *   Windows Mozilla

    *   Mac Safari

    *   Mac Mozilla

    *   Linux Mozilla

    *   Linux Konqueror

    then it will be replaced with a more interesting one. For instance,

        $mech->agent_alias( 'Windows IE 6' );

    sets your User-Agent to

        Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1)

    The list of valid aliases can be returned from "known_agent_aliases()".
    The current list is:

    *   Windows IE 6

    *   Windows Mozilla

    *   Mac Safari

    *   Mac Mozilla

    *   Linux Mozilla

    *   Linux Konqueror

  known_agent_aliases()
    Returns a list of all the agent aliases that Mech knows about.

PAGE-FETCHING METHODS
  $mech->get( $uri )
    Given a URL/URI, fetches it. Returns an HTTP::Response object. *$uri*
    can be a well-formed URL string, a URI object, or a WWW::Mechanize::Link
    object.

    The results are stored internally in the agent object, but you don't
    know that. Just use the accessors listed below. Poking at the internals
    is deprecated and subject to change in the future.

    "get()" is a well-behaved overloaded version of the method in
    LWP::UserAgent. This lets you do things like

        $mech->get( $uri, ':content_file' => $tempfile );

    and you can rest assured that the parms will get filtered down
    appropriately.

    NOTE: Because ":content_file" causes the page contents to be stored in a
    file instead of the response object, some Mech functions that expect it
    to be there won't work as expected. Use with caution.

  $mech->put( $uri, content => $content )
    PUTs *$content* to $uri. Returns an HTTP::Response object. *$uri* can be
    a well-formed URI string, a URI object, or a WWW::Mechanize::Link
    object.

  $mech->reload()
    Acts like the reload button in a browser: repeats the current request.
    The history (as per the "back" method) is not altered.

    Returns the HTTP::Response object from the reload, or "undef" if there's
    no current request.

  $mech->back()
    The equivalent of hitting the "back" button in a browser. Returns to the
    previous page. Won't go back past the first page. (Really, what would it
    do if it could?)

    Returns true if it could go back, or false if not.

  $mech->history_count()
    This returns the number of items in the browser history. This number
    *does* include the most recently made request.

  $mech->history($n)
    This returns the *n*th item in history. The 0th item is the most recent
    request and response, which would be acted on by methods like
    "find_link()". The 1th item is the state you'd return to if you called
    "back()".

    The maximum useful value for $n is "$mech->history_count - 1". Requests
    beyond that bound will return "undef".

    History items are returned as hash references, in the form:

      { req => $http_request, res => $http_response }

STATUS METHODS
  $mech->success()
    Returns a boolean telling whether the last request was successful. If
    there hasn't been an operation yet, returns false.

    This is a convenience function that wraps "$mech->res->is_success".

  $mech->uri()
    Returns the current URI as a URI object. This object stringifies to the
    URI itself.

  $mech->response() / $mech->res()
    Return the current response as an HTTP::Response object.

    Synonym for "$mech->response()"

  $mech->status()
    Returns the HTTP status code of the response. This is a 3-digit number
    like 200 for OK, 404 for not found, and so on.

  $mech->ct() / $mech->content_type()
    Returns the content type of the response.

  $mech->base()
    Returns the base URI for the current response

  $mech->forms()
    When called in a list context, returns a list of the forms found in the
    last fetched page. In a scalar context, returns a reference to an array
    with those forms. The forms returned are all HTML::Form objects.

  $mech->current_form()
    Returns the current form as an HTML::Form object.

  $mech->links()
    When called in a list context, returns a list of the links found in the
    last fetched page. In a scalar context it returns a reference to an
    array with those links. Each link is a WWW::Mechanize::Link object.

  $mech->is_html()
    Returns true/false on whether our content is HTML, according to the HTTP
    headers.

  $mech->title()
    Returns the contents of the "<TITLE>" tag, as parsed by
    HTML::HeadParser. Returns undef if the content is not HTML.

CONTENT-HANDLING METHODS
  $mech->content(...)
    Returns the content that the mech uses internally for the last page
    fetched. Ordinarily this is the same as
    "$mech->response()->decoded_content()", but this may differ for HTML
    documents if "update_html" is overloaded (in which case the value passed
    to the base-class implementation of same will be returned), and/or extra
    named arguments are passed to *content()*:

    *$mech->content( format => 'text' )*
      Returns a text-only version of the page, with all HTML markup
      stripped. This feature requires *HTML::TreeBuilder* to be installed,
      or a fatal error will be thrown. This works only if the contents are
      HTML.

    *$mech->content( base_href => [$base_href|undef] )*
      Returns the HTML document, modified to contain a "<base
      href="$base_href">" mark-up in the header. *$base_href* is
      "$mech->base()" if not specified. This is handy to pass the HTML to
      e.g. HTML::Display. This works only if the contents are HTML.

    *$mech->content( raw => 1 )*
      Returns "$self->response()->content()", i.e. the raw contents from the
      response.

    *$mech->content( decoded_by_headers => 1 )*
      Returns the content after applying all "Content-Encoding" headers but
      with not additional mangling.

    *$mech->content( charset => $charset )*
      Returns "$self->response()->decoded_content(charset => $charset)" (see
      HTTP::Response for details).

    To preserve backwards compatibility, additional parameters will be
    ignored unless none of "raw | decoded_by_headers | charset" is specified
    and the text is HTML, in which case an error will be triggered.

  $mech->text()
    Returns the text of the current HTML content. If the content isn't HTML,
    $mech will die.

    The text is extracted by parsing the content, and then the extracted
    text is cached, so don't worry about performance of calling this
    repeatedly.

LINK METHODS
  $mech->links()
    Lists all the links on the current page. Each link is a
    WWW::Mechanize::Link object. In list context, returns a list of all
    links. In scalar context, returns an array reference of all links.

  $mech->follow_link(...)
    Follows a specified link on the page. You specify the match to be found
    using the same parms that "find_link()" uses.

    Here some examples:

    *   3rd link called "download"

            $mech->follow_link( text => 'download', n => 3 );

    *   first link where the URL has "download" in it, regardless of case:

            $mech->follow_link( url_regex => qr/download/i );

        or

            $mech->follow_link( url_regex => qr/(?i:download)/ );

    *   3rd link on the page

            $mech->follow_link( n => 3 );

    *   the link with the url

            $mech->follow_link( url => '/other/page' );

        or

            $mech->follow_link( url => 'http://example.com/page' );

    Returns the result of the GET method (an HTTP::Response object) if a
    link was found. If the page has no links, or the specified link couldn't
    be found, returns undef.

  $mech->find_link( ... )
    Finds a link in the currently fetched page. It returns a
    WWW::Mechanize::Link object which describes the link. (You'll probably
    be most interested in the "url()" property.) If it fails to find a link
    it returns undef.

    You can take the URL part and pass it to the "get()" method. If that's
    your plan, you might as well use the "follow_link()" method directly,
    since it does the "get()" for you automatically.

    Note that "<FRAME SRC="...">" tags are parsed out of the the HTML and
    treated as links so this method works with them.

    You can select which link to find by passing in one or more of these
    key/value pairs:

    *   "text => 'string'," and "text_regex => qr/regex/,"

        "text" matches the text of the link against *string*, which must be
        an exact match. To select a link with text that is exactly
        "download", use

            $mech->find_link( text => 'download' );

        "text_regex" matches the text of the link against *regex*. To select
        a link with text that has "download" anywhere in it, regardless of
        case, use

            $mech->find_link( text_regex => qr/download/i );

        Note that the text extracted from the page's links are trimmed. For
        example, "<a> foo </a>" is stored as 'foo', and searching for
        leading or trailing spaces will fail.

    *   "url => 'string'," and "url_regex => qr/regex/,"

        Matches the URL of the link against *string* or *regex*, as
        appropriate. The URL may be a relative URL, like foo/bar.html,
        depending on how it's coded on the page.

    *   "url_abs => string" and "url_abs_regex => regex"

        Matches the absolute URL of the link against *string* or *regex*, as
        appropriate. The URL will be an absolute URL, even if it's relative
        in the page.

    *   "name => string" and "name_regex => regex"

        Matches the name of the link against *string* or *regex*, as
        appropriate.

    *   "id => string" and "id_regex => regex"

        Matches the attribute 'id' of the link against *string* or *regex*,
        as appropriate.

    *   "class => string" and "class_regex => regex"

        Matches the attribute 'class' of the link against *string* or
        *regex*, as appropriate.

    *   "tag => string" and "tag_regex => regex"

        Matches the tag that the link came from against *string* or *regex*,
        as appropriate. The "tag_regex" is probably most useful to check for
        more than one tag, as in:

            $mech->find_link( tag_regex => qr/^(a|frame)$/ );

        The tags and attributes looked at are defined below, at
        "$mech->find_link() : link format".

    If "n" is not specified, it defaults to 1. Therefore, if you don't
    specify any parms, this method defaults to finding the first link on the
    page.

    Note that you can specify multiple text or URL parameters, which will be
    ANDed together. For example, to find the first link with text of "News"
    and with "cnn.com" in the URL, use:

        $mech->find_link( text => 'News', url_regex => qr/cnn\.com/ );

    The return value is a reference to an array containing a
    WWW::Mechanize::Link object for every link in "$self->content".

    The links come from the following:

    "<a href=...>"
    "<area href=...>"
    "<frame src=...>"
    "<iframe src=...>"
    "<link href=...>"
    "<meta content=...>"

  $mech->find_all_links( ... )
    Returns all the links on the current page that match the criteria. The
    method for specifying link criteria is the same as in "find_link()".
    Each of the links returned is a WWW::Mechanize::Link object.

    In list context, "find_all_links()" returns a list of the links.
    Otherwise, it returns a reference to the list of links.

    "find_all_links()" with no parameters returns all links in the page.

  $mech->find_all_inputs( ... criteria ... )
    find_all_inputs() returns an array of all the input controls in the
    current form whose properties match all of the regexes passed in. The
    controls returned are all descended from HTML::Form::Input.

    If no criteria are passed, all inputs will be returned.

    If there is no current page, there is no form on the current page, or
    there are no submit controls in the current form then the return will be
    an empty array.

    You may use a regex or a literal string:

        # get all textarea controls whose names begin with "customer"
        my @customer_text_inputs = $mech->find_all_inputs(
            type       => 'textarea',
            name_regex => qr/^customer/,
        );

        # get all text or textarea controls called "customer"
        my @customer_text_inputs = $mech->find_all_inputs(
            type_regex => qr/^(text|textarea)$/,
            name       => 'customer',
        );

  $mech->find_all_submits( ... criteria ... )
    "find_all_submits()" does the same thing as "find_all_inputs()" except
    that it only returns controls that are submit controls, ignoring other
    types of input controls like text and checkboxes.

IMAGE METHODS
  $mech->images
    Lists all the images on the current page. Each image is a
    WWW::Mechanize::Image object. In list context, returns a list of all
    images. In scalar context, returns an array reference of all images.

  $mech->find_image()
    Finds an image in the current page. It returns a WWW::Mechanize::Image
    object which describes the image. If it fails to find an image it
    returns undef.

    You can select which image to find by passing in one or more of these
    key/value pairs:

    *   "alt => 'string'" and "alt_regex => qr/regex/,"

        "alt" matches the ALT attribute of the image against *string*, which
        must be an exact match. To select a image with an ALT tag that is
        exactly "download", use

            $mech->find_image( alt => 'download' );

        "alt_regex" matches the ALT attribute of the image against a regular
        expression. To select an image with an ALT attribute that has
        "download" anywhere in it, regardless of case, use

            $mech->find_image( alt_regex => qr/download/i );

    *   "url => 'string'," and "url_regex => qr/regex/,"

        Matches the URL of the image against *string* or *regex*, as
        appropriate. The URL may be a relative URL, like foo/bar.html,
        depending on how it's coded on the page.

    *   "url_abs => string" and "url_abs_regex => regex"

        Matches the absolute URL of the image against *string* or *regex*,
        as appropriate. The URL will be an absolute URL, even if it's
        relative in the page.

    *   "tag => string" and "tag_regex => regex"

        Matches the tag that the image came from against *string* or
        *regex*, as appropriate. The "tag_regex" is probably most useful to
        check for more than one tag, as in:

            $mech->find_image( tag_regex => qr/^(img|input)$/ );

        The tags supported are "<img>" and "<input>".

    If "n" is not specified, it defaults to 1. Therefore, if you don't
    specify any parms, this method defaults to finding the first image on
    the page.

    Note that you can specify multiple ALT or URL parameters, which will be
    ANDed together. For example, to find the first image with ALT text of
    "News" and with "cnn.com" in the URL, use:

        $mech->find_image( image => 'News', url_regex => qr/cnn\.com/ );

    The return value is a reference to an array containing a
    WWW::Mechanize::Image object for every image in "$self->content".

  $mech->find_all_images( ... )
    Returns all the images on the current page that match the criteria. The
    method for specifying image criteria is the same as in "find_image()".
    Each of the images returned is a WWW::Mechanize::Image object.

    In list context, "find_all_images()" returns a list of the images.
    Otherwise, it returns a reference to the list of images.

    "find_all_images()" with no parameters returns all images in the page.

FORM METHODS
    These methods let you work with the forms on a page. The idea is to
    choose a form that you'll later work with using the field methods below.

  $mech->forms
    Lists all the forms on the current page. Each form is an HTML::Form
    object. In list context, returns a list of all forms. In scalar context,
    returns an array reference of all forms.

  $mech->form_number($number)
    Selects the *number*th form on the page as the target for subsequent
    calls to "field()" and "click()". Also returns the form that was
    selected.

    If it is found, the form is returned as an HTML::Form object and set
    internally for later use with Mech's form methods such as "field()" and
    "click()".

    Emits a warning and returns undef if no form is found.

    The first form is number 1, not zero.

  $mech->form_name( $name )
    Selects a form by name. If there is more than one form on the page with
    that name, then the first one is used, and a warning is generated.

    If it is found, the form is returned as an HTML::Form object and set
    internally for later use with Mech's form methods such as "field()" and
    "click()".

    Returns undef if no form is found.

  $mech->form_id( $name )
    Selects a form by ID. If there is more than one form on the page with
    that ID, then the first one is used, and a warning is generated.

    If it is found, the form is returned as an HTML::Form object and set
    internally for later use with Mech's form methods such as "field()" and
    "click()".

    If no form is found it returns "undef". This will also trigger a
    warning, unless "quiet" is enabled.

  $mech->all_forms_with_fields( @fields )
    Selects a form by passing in a list of field names it must contain. All
    matching forms (perhaps none) are returned as a list of HTML::Form
    objects.

  $mech->form_with_fields( @fields )
    Selects a form by passing in a list of field names it must contain. If
    there is more than one form on the page with that matches, then the
    first one is used, and a warning is generated.

    If it is found, the form is returned as an HTML::Form object and set
    internally for later used with Mech's form methods such as "field()" and
    "click()".

    Returns undef if no form is found.

    Note that this functionality requires libwww-perl 5.69 or higher.

  $mech->all_forms_with( $attr1 => $value1, $attr2 => $value2, ... )
    Searches for forms with arbitrary attribute/value pairs within the
    <form> tag. (Currently does not work for attribute "action" due to
    implementation details of HTML::Form.) When given more than one pair,
    all criteria must match. Using "undef" as value means that the attribute
    in question may not be present.

    All matching forms (perhaps none) are returned as a list of HTML::Form
    objects.

  $mech->form_with( $attr1 => $value1, $attr2 => $value2, ... )
    Searches for forms with arbitrary attribute/value pairs within the
    <form> tag. (Currently does not work for attribute "action" due to
    implementation details of HTML::Form.) When given more than one pair,
    all criteria must match. Using "undef" as value means that the attribute
    in question may not be present.

    If it is found, the form is returned as an HTML::Form object and set
    internally for later used with Mech's form methods such as "field()" and
    "click()".

    Returns undef if no form is found.

FIELD METHODS
    These methods allow you to set the values of fields in a given form.

  $mech->field( $name, $value, $number )
  $mech->field( $name, \@values, $number )
    Given the name of a field, set its value to the value specified. This
    applies to the current form (as set by the "form_name()" or
    "form_number()" method or defaulting to the first form on the page).

    The optional *$number* parameter is used to distinguish between two
    fields with the same name. The fields are numbered from 1.

  $mech->select($name, $value)
  $mech->select($name, \@values)
    Given the name of a "select" field, set its value to the value
    specified. If the field is not "<select multiple>" and the $value is an
    array, only the first value will be set. [Note: the documentation
    previously claimed that only the last value would be set, but this was
    incorrect.] Passing $value as a hash with an "n" key selects an item by
    number (e.g. "{n => 3}" or "{n => [2,4]}"). The numbering starts at 1.
    This applies to the current form.

    If you have a field with "<select multiple>" and you pass a single
    $value, then $value will be added to the list of fields selected,
    without clearing the others. However, if you pass an array reference,
    then all previously selected values will be cleared.

    Returns true on successfully setting the value. On failure, returns
    false and calls "$self>warn()" with an error message.

  $mech->set_fields( $name => $value ... )
    This method sets multiple fields of the current form. It takes a list of
    field name and value pairs. If there is more than one field with the
    same name, the first one found is set. If you want to select which of
    the duplicate field to set, use a value which is an anonymous array
    which has the field value and its number as the 2 elements.

            # set the second foo field
            $mech->set_fields( $name => [ 'foo', 2 ] );

    The fields are numbered from 1.

    This applies to the current form.

  $mech->set_visible( @criteria )
    This method sets fields of the current form without having to know their
    names. So if you have a login screen that wants a username and password,
    you do not have to fetch the form and inspect the source (or use the
    mech-dump utility, installed with WWW::Mechanize) to see what the field
    names are; you can just say

        $mech->set_visible( $username, $password );

    and the first and second fields will be set accordingly. The method is
    called set_*visible* because it acts only on visible fields; hidden form
    inputs are not considered. The order of the fields is the order in which
    they appear in the HTML source which is nearly always the order anyone
    viewing the page would think they are in, but some creative work with
    tables could change that; caveat user.

    Each element in @criteria is either a field value or a field specifier.
    A field value is a scalar. A field specifier allows you to specify the
    *type* of input field you want to set and is denoted with an arrayref
    containing two elements. So you could specify the first radio button
    with

        $mech->set_visible( [ radio => 'KCRW' ] );

    Field values and specifiers can be intermixed, hence

        $mech->set_visible( 'fred', 'secret', [ option => 'Checking' ] );

    would set the first two fields to "fred" and "secret", and the *next*
    "OPTION" menu field to "Checking".

    The possible field specifier types are: "text", "password", "hidden",
    "textarea", "file", "image", "submit", "radio", "checkbox" and "option".

    "set_visible" returns the number of values set.

  $mech->tick( $name, $value [, $set] )
    "Ticks" the first checkbox that has both the name and value associated
    with it on the current form. Dies if there is no named check box for
    that value. Passing in a false value as the third optional argument will
    cause the checkbox to be unticked.

  $mech->untick($name, $value)
    Causes the checkbox to be unticked. Shorthand for
    "tick($name,$value,undef)"

  $mech->value( $name [, $number] )
    Given the name of a field, return its value. This applies to the current
    form.

    The optional *$number* parameter is used to distinguish between two
    fields with the same name. The fields are numbered from 1.

    If the field is of type file (file upload field), the value is always
    cleared to prevent remote sites from downloading your local files. To
    upload a file, specify its file name explicitly.

  $mech->click( $button [, $x, $y] )
    Has the effect of clicking a button on the current form. The first
    argument is the name of the button to be clicked. The second and third
    arguments (optional) allow you to specify the (x,y) coordinates of the
    click.

    If there is only one button on the form, "$mech->click()" with no
    arguments simply clicks that one button.

    Returns an HTTP::Response object.

  $mech->click_button( ... )
    Has the effect of clicking a button on the current form by specifying
    its name, value, or index. Its arguments are a list of key/value pairs.
    Only one of name, number, input or value must be specified in the keys.

    *   "name => name"

        Clicks the button named *name* in the current form.

    *   "id => id"

        Clicks the button with the id *id* in the current form.

    *   "number => n"

        Clicks the *n*th button in the current form. Numbering starts at 1.

    *   "value => value"

        Clicks the button with the value *value* in the current form.

    *   "input => $inputobject"

        Clicks on the button referenced by $inputobject, an instance of
        HTML::Form::SubmitInput obtained e.g. from

            $mech->current_form()->find_input( undef, 'submit' )

        $inputobject must belong to the current form.

    *   "x => x"

    *   "y => y"

        These arguments (optional) allow you to specify the (x,y)
        coordinates of the click.

  $mech->submit()
    Submits the page, without specifying a button to click. Actually, no
    button is clicked at all.

    Returns an HTTP::Response object.

    This used to be a synonym for "$mech->click( 'submit' )", but is no
    longer so.

  $mech->submit_form( ... )
    This method lets you select a form from the previously fetched page,
    fill in its fields, and submit it. It combines the
    form_number/form_name, set_fields and click methods into one higher
    level call. Its arguments are a list of key/value pairs, all of which
    are optional.

    *   "fields => \%fields"

        Specifies the fields to be filled in the current form.

    *   "with_fields => \%fields"

        Probably all you need for the common case. It combines a smart form
        selector and data setting in one operation. It selects the first
        form that contains all fields mentioned in "\%fields". This is nice
        because you don't need to know the name or number of the form to do
        this.

        (calls "form_with_fields()" and "set_fields()").

        If you choose this, the form_number, form_name, form_id and fields
        options will be ignored.

    *   "form_number => n"

        Selects the *n*th form (calls "form_number()"). If this parm is not
        specified, the currently-selected form is used.

    *   "form_name => name"

        Selects the form named *name* (calls "form_name()")

    *   "form_id => ID"

        Selects the form with ID *ID* (calls "form_id()")

    *   "button => button"

        Clicks on button *button* (calls "click()")

    *   "x => x, y => y"

        Sets the x or y values for "click()"

    If no form is selected, the first form found is used.

    If *button* is not passed, then the "submit()" method is used instead.

    If you want to submit a file and get its content from a scalar rather
    than a file in the filesystem, you can use:

        $mech->submit_form(with_fields => { logfile => [ [ undef, 'whatever', Content => $content ], 1 ] } );

    Returns an HTTP::Response object.

MISCELLANEOUS METHODS
  $mech->add_header( name => $value [, name => $value... ] )
    Sets HTTP headers for the agent to add or remove from the HTTP request.

        $mech->add_header( Encoding => 'text/klingon' );

    If a *value* is "undef", then that header will be removed from any
    future requests. For example, to never send a Referer header:

        $mech->add_header( Referer => undef );

    If you want to delete a header, use "delete_header".

    Returns the number of name/value pairs added.

    NOTE: This method was very different in WWW::Mechanize before 1.00. Back
    then, the headers were stored in a package hash, not as a member of the
    object instance. Calling "add_header()" would modify the headers for
    every WWW::Mechanize object, even after your object no longer existed.

  $mech->delete_header( name [, name ... ] )
    Removes HTTP headers from the agent's list of special headers. For
    instance, you might need to do something like:

        # Don't send a Referer for this URL
        $mech->add_header( Referer => undef );

        # Get the URL
        $mech->get( $url );

        # Back to the default behavior
        $mech->delete_header( 'Referer' );

  $mech->quiet(true/false)
    Allows you to suppress warnings to the screen.

        $mech->quiet(0); # turns on warnings (the default)
        $mech->quiet(1); # turns off warnings
        $mech->quiet();  # returns the current quietness status

  $mech->stack_depth( $max_depth )
    Get or set the page stack depth. Use this if you're doing a lot of page
    scraping and running out of memory.

    A value of 0 means "no history at all." By default, the max stack depth
    is humongously large, effectively keeping all history.

  $mech->save_content( $filename, %opts )
    Dumps the contents of "$mech->content" into *$filename*. *$filename*
    will be overwritten. Dies if there are any errors.

    If the content type does not begin with "text/", then the content is
    saved in binary mode (i.e. "binmode()" is set on the output filehandle).

    Additional arguments can be passed as *key*/*value* pairs:

    *$mech->save_content( $filename, binary => 1 )*
        Filehandle is set with "binmode" to ":raw" and contents are taken
        calling "$self->content(decoded_by_headers => 1)". Same as calling:

            $mech->save_content( $filename, binmode => ':raw',
                                 decoded_by_headers => 1 );

        This *should* be the safest way to save contents verbatim.

    *$mech->save_content( $filename, binmode => $binmode )*
        Filehandle is set to binary mode. If $binmode begins with ':', it is
        passed as a parameter to "binmode":

            binmode $fh, $binmode;

        otherwise the filehandle is set to binary mode if $binmode is true:

            binmode $fh;

    *all other arguments*
        are passed as-is to "$mech->content(%opts)". In particular,
        "decoded_by_headers" might come handy if you want to revert the
        effect of line compression performed by the web server but without
        further interpreting the contents (e.g. decoding it according to the
        charset).

  $mech->dump_headers( [$fh] )
    Prints a dump of the HTTP response headers for the most recent response.
    If *$fh* is not specified or is undef, it dumps to STDOUT.

    Unlike the rest of the dump_* methods, $fh can be a scalar. It will be
    used as a file name.

  $mech->dump_links( [[$fh], $absolute] )
    Prints a dump of the links on the current page to *$fh*. If *$fh* is not
    specified or is undef, it dumps to STDOUT.

    If *$absolute* is true, links displayed are absolute, not relative.

  $mech->dump_images( [[$fh], $absolute] )
    Prints a dump of the images on the current page to *$fh*. If *$fh* is
    not specified or is undef, it dumps to STDOUT.

    If *$absolute* is true, links displayed are absolute, not relative.

  $mech->dump_forms( [$fh] )
    Prints a dump of the forms on the current page to *$fh*. If *$fh* is not
    specified or is undef, it dumps to STDOUT.

  $mech->dump_text( [$fh] )
    Prints a dump of the text on the current page to *$fh*. If *$fh* is not
    specified or is undef, it dumps to STDOUT.

OVERRIDDEN LWP::UserAgent METHODS
  $mech->clone()
    Clone the mech object. The clone will be using the same cookie jar as
    the original mech.

  $mech->redirect_ok()
    An overloaded version of "redirect_ok()" in LWP::UserAgent. This method
    is used to determine whether a redirection in the request should be
    followed.

    Note that WWW::Mechanize's constructor pushes POST on to the agent's
    "requests_redirectable" list.

  $mech->request( $request [, $arg [, $size]])
    Overloaded version of "request()" in LWP::UserAgent. Performs the actual
    request. Normally, if you're using WWW::Mechanize, it's because you
    don't want to deal with this level of stuff anyway.

    Note that $request will be modified.

    Returns an HTTP::Response object.

  $mech->update_html( $html )
    Allows you to replace the HTML that the mech has found. Updates the
    forms and links parse-trees that the mech uses internally.

    Say you have a page that you know has malformed output, and you want to
    update it so the links come out correctly:

        my $html = $mech->content;
        $html =~ s[</option>.{0,3}</td>][</option></select></td>]isg;
        $mech->update_html( $html );

    This method is also used internally by the mech itself to update its own
    HTML content when loading a page. This means that if you would like to
    *systematically* perform the above HTML substitution, you would overload
    *update_html* in a subclass thusly:

       package MyMech;
       use base 'WWW::Mechanize';

       sub update_html {
           my ($self, $html) = @_;
           $html =~ s[</option>.{0,3}</td>][</option></select></td>]isg;
           $self->WWW::Mechanize::update_html( $html );
       }

    If you do this, then the mech will use the tidied-up HTML instead of the
    original both when parsing for its own needs, and for returning to you
    through "content".

    Overloading this method is also the recommended way of implementing
    extra validation steps (e.g. link checkers) for every HTML page
    received. "warn" and "die" would then come in handy to signal validation
    errors.

  $mech->credentials( $username, $password )
    Provide credentials to be used for HTTP Basic authentication for all
    sites and realms until further notice.

    The four argument form described in LWP::UserAgent is still supported.

  $mech->get_basic_credentials( $realm, $uri, $isproxy )
    Returns the credentials for the realm and URI.

  $mech->clear_credentials()
    Remove any credentials set up with "credentials()".

INHERITED UNCHANGED LWP::UserAgent METHODS
    As a subclass of LWP::UserAgent, WWW::Mechanize inherits all of
    LWP::UserAgent's methods. Many of which are overridden or extended. The
    following methods are inherited unchanged. View the LWP::UserAgent
    documentation for their implementation descriptions.

    This is not meant to be an inclusive list. LWP::UA may have added
    others.

  $mech->head()
    Inherited from LWP::UserAgent.

  $mech->post()
    Inherited from LWP::UserAgent.

  $mech->mirror()
    Inherited from LWP::UserAgent.

  $mech->simple_request()
    Inherited from LWP::UserAgent.

  $mech->is_protocol_supported()
    Inherited from LWP::UserAgent.

  $mech->prepare_request()
    Inherited from LWP::UserAgent.

  $mech->progress()
    Inherited from LWP::UserAgent.

INTERNAL-ONLY METHODS
    These methods are only used internally. You probably don't need to know
    about them.

  $mech->_update_page($request, $response)
    Updates all internal variables in $mech as if $request was just
    performed, and returns $response. The page stack is not altered by this
    method, it is up to caller (e.g. "request") to do that.

  $mech->_modify_request( $req )
    Modifies a HTTP::Request before the request is sent out, for both GET
    and POST requests.

    We add a "Referer" header, as well as header to note that we can accept
    gzip encoded content, if Compress::Zlib is installed.

  $mech->_make_request()
    Convenience method to make it easier for subclasses like
    WWW::Mechanize::Cached to intercept the request.

  $mech->_reset_page()
    Resets the internal fields that track page parsed stuff.

  $mech->_extract_links()
    Extracts links from the content of a webpage, and populates the
    "{links}" property with WWW::Mechanize::Link objects.

  $mech->_push_page_stack()
    The agent keeps a stack of visited pages, which it can pop when it needs
    to go BACK and so on.

    The current page needs to be pushed onto the stack before we get a new
    page, and the stack needs to be popped when BACK occurs.

    Neither of these take any arguments, they just operate on the $mech
    object.

  warn( @messages )
    Centralized warning method, for diagnostics and non-fatal problems.
    Defaults to calling "CORE::warn", but may be overridden by setting
    "onwarn" in the constructor.

  die( @messages )
    Centralized error method. Defaults to calling "CORE::die", but may be
    overridden by setting "onerror" in the constructor.

WWW::MECHANIZE'S GIT REPOSITORY
    WWW::Mechanize is hosted at GitHub.

    Repository: <https://github.com/libwww-perl/WWW-Mechanize>. Bugs:
    <https://github.com/libwww-perl/WWW-Mechanize/issues>.

OTHER DOCUMENTATION
  *Spidering Hacks*, by Kevin Hemenway and Tara Calishain
    *Spidering Hacks* from O'Reilly
    (<http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/spiderhks/>) is a great book for anyone
    wanting to know more about screen-scraping and spidering.

    There are six hacks that use Mech or a Mech derivative:

    #21 WWW::Mechanize 101
    #22 Scraping with WWW::Mechanize
    #36 Downloading Images from Webshots
    #44 Archiving Yahoo! Groups Messages with WWW::Yahoo::Groups
    #64 Super Author Searching
    #73 Scraping TV Listings

    The book was also positively reviewed on Slashdot:
    <http://books.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/12/11/2126256>

ONLINE RESOURCES AND SUPPORT
    *   WWW::Mechanize mailing list

        The Mech mailing list is at
        <http://groups.google.com/group/www-mechanize-users> and is specific
        to Mechanize, unlike the LWP mailing list below. Although it is a
        users list, all development discussion takes place here, too.

    *   LWP mailing list

        The LWP mailing list is at
        <http://lists.perl.org/showlist.cgi?name=libwww>, and is more
        user-oriented and well-populated than the WWW::Mechanize list.

    *   Perlmonks

        <http://perlmonks.org> is an excellent community of support, and
        many questions about Mech have already been answered there.

    *   WWW::Mechanize::Examples

        A random array of examples submitted by users, included with the
        Mechanize distribution.

ARTICLES ABOUT WWW::MECHANIZE
    *   <http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/linux/library/wa-perlsecure/>

        IBM article "Secure Web site access with Perl"

    *   <http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/googlehks2/chapter/hack84.pdf>

        Leland Johnson's hack #84 in *Google Hacks, 2nd Edition* is an
        example of a production script that uses WWW::Mechanize and
        HTML::TableContentParser. It takes in keywords and returns the
        estimated price of these keywords on Google's AdWords program.

    *   <http://www.perl.com/pub/a/2004/06/04/recorder.html>

        Linda Julien writes about using HTTP::Recorder to create
        WWW::Mechanize scripts.

    *   <http://www.developer.com/lang/other/article.php/3454041>

        Jason Gilmore's article on using WWW::Mechanize for scraping sales
        information from Amazon and eBay.

    *   <http://www.perl.com/pub/a/2003/01/22/mechanize.html>

        Chris Ball's article about using WWW::Mechanize for scraping TV
        listings.

    *   <http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/LinuxMag/col47.html>

        Randal Schwartz's article on scraping Yahoo News for images. It's
        already out of date: He manually walks the list of links hunting for
        matches, which wouldn't have been necessary if the "find_link()"
        method existed at press time.

    *   <http://www.perladvent.org/2002/16th/>

        WWW::Mechanize on the Perl Advent Calendar, by Mark Fowler.

    *   <http://www.linux-magazin.de/Ausgaben/2004/03/Datenruessel/%28langua
        ge%29/ger-DE>

        Michael Schilli's article on Mech and WWW::Mechanize::Shell for the
        German magazine *Linux Magazin*.

  Other modules that use Mechanize
    Here are modules that use or subclass Mechanize. Let me know of any
    others:

    *   Finance::Bank::LloydsTSB

    *   HTTP::Recorder

        Acts as a proxy for web interaction, and then generates
        WWW::Mechanize scripts.

    *   Win32::IE::Mechanize

        Just like Mech, but using Microsoft Internet Explorer to do the
        work.

    *   WWW::Bugzilla

    *   WWW::CheckSite

    *   WWW::Google::Groups

    *   WWW::Hotmail

    *   WWW::Mechanize::Cached

    *   WWW::Mechanize::Cached::GZip

    *   WWW::Mechanize::FormFiller

    *   WWW::Mechanize::Shell

    *   WWW::Mechanize::Sleepy

    *   WWW::Mechanize::SpamCop

    *   WWW::Mechanize::Timed

    *   WWW::SourceForge

    *   WWW::Yahoo::Groups

    *   WWW::Scripter

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
    Thanks to the numerous people who have helped out on WWW::Mechanize in
    one way or another, including Kirrily Robert for the original
    "WWW::Automate", Lyle Hopkins, Damien Clark, Ansgar Burchardt, Gisle
    Aas, Jeremy Ary, Hilary Holz, Rafael Kitover, Norbert Buchmuller, Dave
    Page, David Sainty, H.Merijn Brand, Matt Lawrence, Michael Schwern,
    Adriano Ferreira, Miyagawa, Peteris Krumins, Rafael Kitover, David
    Steinbrunner, Kevin Falcone, Mike O'Regan, Mark Stosberg, Uri Guttman,
    Peter Scott, Phillipe Bruhat, Ian Langworth, John Beppu, Gavin Estey,
    Jim Brandt, Ask Bjoern Hansen, Greg Davies, Ed Silva, Mark-Jason
    Dominus, Autrijus Tang, Mark Fowler, Stuart Children, Max Maischein,
    Meng Wong, Prakash Kailasa, Abigail, Jan Pazdziora, Dominique
    Quatravaux, Scott Lanning, Rob Casey, Leland Johnson, Joshua Gatcomb,
    Julien Beasley, Abe Timmerman, Peter Stevens, Pete Krawczyk, Tad
    McClellan, and the late great Iain Truskett.

AUTHOR
    Andy Lester <andy at petdance.com>

COPYRIGHT AND LICENSE
    This software is copyright (c) 2004-2016 by Andy Lester.

    This is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under
    the same terms as the Perl 5 programming language system itself.

