The Path to Web Data: Build or Buy?
Data is the beating heart of this engine that we all know as digital space. Everything out there on the internet, every photo that is ever taken, every article that is ever written, and every video ever played comprises data and data only. Many businesses and organizations are coming to realize the value of the data and how valuable it is to their business. Often, the available data on the web out there is more advantageous than the data you have in-house. There are talks of even harnessing the power of the data that is present on the web and then using it for your own specified business purposes.
But here is a classic irony right there; the web data in its entirety is customized and tailored to be read, interact with, and make sense for the humans. Server systems, computers, IT infrastructure, or machines, in general, lack the capability to understand that data in its specific form. Fortunately, there are resources present out there that might help you have access to this amazing resource at hand by the use of web scrappers.
Web scrappers are the digital tools engineered in such a way that they can convert the specific data format, which are images, videos, and other substantial elements, into raw data that can be understood or interpreted by the machines. Either you can buy or use the solutions that are already available on the internet or go about developing your very own web scrapping tool/solution by talking it out with your development team.
Factors to Consider When Building the Solution
Developing a solution that can convert/change all the web data into a tangible and readable element by the machines will not be an easy task. There are going to be different subsets and factors that you need to consider when dealing with it. You are going to have to invest some serious load of money, man-hours, using resources of some of which will not be available to you during the initiation and other such elements.
That is why, before making your decision, whether to buy or build your own solution, you must have all the details there are. You must know what is at stake. Following are some of the factors that you need to bring under consideration when deciding to build a solution for yourself.
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- The Scale of the Solution That Is Needed
The first thing that you need to understand is the use case for the solution that you will be building for yourself. Do you want to use it around the clock, or do you need something that is seasonable and wants to make it work whenever needed? If the latter is the case with you, instead of going for a full overhaul where you will have to install servers, put teams to work, and manage the solution at all times, use a simple programming language and build yourself a regular web scrapper?
But on the other hand, if you wish to use this tool consistently and not only for some of the websites but also for plenty of websites and different domains, it would be much more feasible to just build a very solution of your own and manage it in-house.
- What About Staffing?
It goes without saying that if you are building a very solution of your own and it will be managed in-house at all times, you require some staff around to cater to its maintenance needs. Staffing needs and associated costs should be determined right away instead of simply being lazy around it only to get a shock afterward. On the other hand, the staffing needs would depend on what you want to do with this tool of yours. If you simply want to use it in-house and not outsource it as a subscription to your clients, then there is no need to hire external help as your in-house professionals can take care of it.
On the other hand, if you require it to be sold as a subscription model to your users, you need a pretty far-fetched team of professionals who can take care of the front end and back end code development, user experience, and database implementation to begin with. You should also think about hiring a leader or manager with immense knowledge of web data and can help your team develop and manage it for your company.
- Maintaining the Solution
This is the most critical and uncalled for aspect about the hidden costs associated with maintaining the solution you have built. Because you are required to maintain its normal functioning every day and remove the bugs, keep all of its definitions up to date at all times and then add new capabilities within the program every passing day. All of it needs to be done in order to increase the user experience with the tool/solution that you have built, and it would require immense availability of costs over time.
There is also a risk of your tool/solution that you have developed going obsolete as the websites you were scrapping data from upgrade themselves with new security definitions installed. You need to do the same with your tool, or otherwise, it will be a lost cause for sure.
- Opportunity Costs
This is another type of cost that you need to weigh in when working with the solution's in-house development. As you are going to re-associate your engineers and technicians to develop this new solution for you, they won't be able to work on the maintenance or development of the core applications. You need to account for the total cost it would incur regarding the loss of revenue that you could have generated from your core business and the cost of the man-hours spent by your engineers to develop the new platform.
You have all the information you require in order to make the decision for yourself but if you go with the less costly option of developing a solution using a simple programming language, then keep Python certification in mind as it will help you to learn all the fundamentals of the Python so you can start with the development of the solution.
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