Documentation

Pagination: follow the next-page link (JavaScript)

Read a catalog from its first page to its last without guessing the page count. The scenario follows links supplied by the source.

Choose JavaScript, paste the complete source from this article and set the run parameters below. The source for this collection is ScrapingCourse. This walkthrough applies to the specified demonstration page.

Example settings

{
  "path": "/pagination",
  "mode": "http",
  "expected": 147
}

path selects the page, mode selects an algorithm branch, and expected sets the control count for this example. It is not a plan limit. When the source dataset changes, check the expected count against it.

How the algorithm works

Open /pagination with mode: http. The url variable holds the page that should be processed next.
Check whether the URL is in visited, then mark it as visited. This tracks pages, independently of products.
Fetch the HTML and pass it to the collection function, which emits only products not encountered before.
Look for a[rel="next"] or a.next.page-numbers. If neither link is present, finish the loop rather than inventing another page number.
Resolve a relative next link to a complete URL. Both absolute links and short source links can then be followed.
Compare the final unique product count with expected to detect a missed page.

Products are processed by collect(html). Read the name first, skip empty names, and use the card link as the key, falling back to the name when necessary. seen prevents the same key being emitted twice. This matters when a later HTML read includes products already collected.

Details that matter

The algorithm keeps two separate collections: visited prevents page loops, while seen prevents duplicate product output.

JavaScript details

JavaScript uses an asynchronous run function. Await network and browser actions; parsing already received HTML is synchronous. collect closes over the shared product-key Set. Its return value is the card count in the current HTML, not the number of new records.

Expected output

The configured demonstration dataset expects 147 unique records. The final check compares the actual unique key count with expected.

Field	Contents
`name`	Product name with leading and trailing whitespace removed.
`price`	Price converted from text to a number.
`image`	Image URL read from the card src attribute.

Complete scenario source

The source is shared by this collection. This example runs its http branch using the parameters above. Copy the complete block into the JavaScript editor; no fixed sign-in credentials or service keys need to be added.

async function run(ctx) {
  const origin = 'https://www.scrapingcourse.com';
  const path = String(ctx.param('path', '/pagination'));
  const mode = String(ctx.param('mode', 'http'));
  const auto = ctx.param('auto_captcha', true) !== false;
  const seen = new Set();
  const collect = (html) => {
    const dom = ctx.dom(html);
    for (const card of dom.qa('.product-item, li.product')) {
      const name = card.q('.product-name, .woocommerce-loop-product__title')?.text().trim() ?? '';
      const key = card.q('a')?.attr('href') ?? name;
      if (!name || seen.has(key)) continue;
      const price = ctx.text().money(card.q('.product-price, .price')?.text() ?? '');
      const image = card.q('img')?.attr('src') ?? '';
      seen.add(key);
      ctx.emit({name, price, image}, key);
    }
    return dom.qa('.product-item, li.product').length;
  };
  if (mode === 'http') {
    let url = origin + path;
    const visited = new Set();
    while (url && visited.size < 50) {
      if (visited.has(url)) throw new Error('Pagination returned an already processed page');
      visited.add(url);
      const response = await ctx.http().withoutCache().get(url, auto);
      if (!response.ok()) throw new Error('The source could not be opened: ' + response.status);
      const html = response.body;
      collect(html);
      const next = ctx.dom(html).attr('a[rel="next"], a.next.page-numbers', 'href');
      url = next ? ctx.url().absolutize(url, next) : null;
    }
    if (url) throw new Error('The pagination safety limit was reached');
  } else {
    const page = await ctx.browser().open(origin + path, ['*/ajax/products*'], {}, auto);
    try {
      if (mode === 'login') {
        const dom = ctx.dom(await page.content());
        const hint = dom.qa('p').map(node => node.text()).find(text => text.includes('Demo Credentials:')) ?? '';
        const password = hint.match(/Password:\s*([^\s|]+)/i)?.[1];
        let email = hint.match(/Email:\s*([^\s|]+@[^\s|]+)/i)?.[1];
        const encoded = dom.attr('[data-cfemail]', 'data-cfemail');
        if (!email && encoded && encoded.length > 2) {
          const key = parseInt(encoded.slice(0, 2), 16);
          email = '';
          for (let i = 2; i < encoded.length; i += 2) email += String.fromCharCode(parseInt(encoded.slice(i, i + 2), 16) ^ key);
        }
        if (!email || !password) throw new Error('The page does not contain demo credentials');
        await page.type('#email', email);
        await page.type('#password', password);
        await page.click('button[type="submit"]');
      }
      if (mode === 'challenge') {
        const text = (ctx.dom(await page.content()).text('body') ?? '').replace(/\s+/g, ' ');
        if (!/You (?:successfully )?bypassed|successfully bypassed|Congratulations/i.test(text)) throw new Error('The expected page content was not received');
        ctx.emit({name: path, passed: true}, path);
      } else {
        await page.waitFor('.product-name:not(:empty)', 15000);
        if (mode === 'button') {
          let complete = false;
          for (let i = 0; i < 30; i++) {
            const before = ctx.dom(await page.content());
            collect(await page.content());
            const button = before.q('#load-more-btn');
            if (!button || /display:\s*none/.test(button.attr('style') ?? '')) { complete = true; break; }
            const offset = button.attr('data-offset');
            const count = before.qa('.product-item').length;
            await page.click('#load-more-btn');
            const response = await page.waitForResponse('*offset=' + offset, 15000);
            if (!response || (Number(response.status) < 200 || Number(response.status) >= 300) || response.truncated || response.error) throw new Error('The next batch could not be loaded');
            if (String(response.body ?? '').trim() === '') { complete = true; break; }
            await page.waitFor('.product-item:nth-child(' + (count + 1) + ')');
          }
          if (!complete) throw new Error('The batch loading safety limit was reached');
        }
        if (mode === 'scroll') {
          let stable = 0;
          let previous = 0;
          for (let i = 0; i < 40 && stable < 3; i++) {
            await page.scroll(3, 400);
            const count = collect(await page.content());
            stable = count === previous ? stable + 1 : 0;
            previous = count;
          }
          if (stable < 3) throw new Error('The feed is still loading: increase the scroll limit');
        }
        collect(await page.content());
      }
    } finally { await page.close(); }
  }
  const expected = Number(ctx.param('expected', 1));
  if (mode !== 'challenge' && seen.size !== expected) throw new Error('Incomplete result: ' + seen.size + ' instead of ' + expected);
}