---
name: browser-automation
description: >
  This skill should be used when the user asks to "build web automation scripts",
  "check browser automation for detection", "generate web scraping code",
  "create form filling automation", or "build anti-detection browser scripts".
license: MIT + Commons Clause
metadata:
  version: 1.0.0
  author: borghei
  category: engineering
  domain: web-automation
  updated: 2026-04-02
  tags: [browser-automation, web-scraping, anti-detection, form-automation, selenium]
---

# Browser Automation

> **Category:** Engineering
> **Domain:** Web Automation

## Overview

The **Browser Automation** skill provides tools for building robust web automation, checking scripts for bot detection signatures, generating form automation code, and creating web scraping solutions with rate limiting and best practices.

## Quick Start

```bash
# Check automation script for detection signatures
python scripts/anti_detection_checker.py --file ./my_scraper.py

# Generate form automation code from HTML
python scripts/form_automation_builder.py --url https://example.com/form --output form_script.py

# Generate scraping code with rate limiting
python scripts/scraping_toolkit.py --url https://example.com --strategy polite --output scraper.py
```

## Tools Overview

| Tool | Purpose | Key Flags |
|------|---------|-----------|
| `anti_detection_checker.py` | Audit automation code for bot detection signatures | `--file`, `--format` |
| `form_automation_builder.py` | Generate form filling scripts from HTML analysis | `--url`, `--html-file`, `--output` |
| `scraping_toolkit.py` | Generate web scraping code with rate limiting | `--url`, `--strategy`, `--output` |

## Workflows

### Build Reliable Scraper
1. Analyze target with `scraping_toolkit.py` to generate base code
2. Check generated code with `anti_detection_checker.py`
3. Address any detection signatures found
4. Test with progressive rate limiting

### Automate Form Submission
1. Provide form HTML to `form_automation_builder.py`
2. Review generated script for field mappings
3. Customize data sources and validation
4. Run anti-detection check on final script

## Reference Documentation

- [Browser Automation Guide](references/browser-automation-guide.md) - Anti-detection techniques, rate limiting strategies, ethical scraping practices

## Common Patterns

### Polite Scraping
- Respect robots.txt directives
- Implement exponential backoff on errors
- Use 2-5 second delays between requests
- Identify your bot with a descriptive User-Agent
- Cache responses to minimize repeat requests

### Anti-Detection Best Practices
- Rotate User-Agent strings realistically
- Randomize request timing (avoid fixed intervals)
- Handle cookies and sessions properly
- Avoid headless browser fingerprinting tells