A program to grab and parse data on government bills
To make use of this program, you will need to install node.js, a JavaScript runtime. It was coded in 12.2.0, so later versions are recommended.
- The latest version of node.js can be found at https://nodejs.org/en/download/current/
- The stable version of node.js can be found at https://nodejs.org/en/download/ After you have downloaded your desired node.js installer, run it and follow the dialogue options. Make sure that npm is installed along with node. It will be needed in a later step.
Download this repo like you would any other repository. For those of you who know how to do this, skip to the next section.
The easiest method, for those that know they will only want one version, is to download this project as a zip. To do so, click the button in the top right of this area labelled Clone or download and then Download zip. Download the zip file, and extract its contents to your desired location.
If you want to download this with git, either use command-line git (download from https://git-scm.com/downloads if you don't have it already) or github desktop (https://desktop.github.com/).
Navigate with your terminal to where you want the files to be downloaded, then run the following command.
git clone https://github.com/zschaefle/LegilationTracker
The project will be downloaded to whatever directory the command line was is when the command was run, just wait for it to finish.
click the button in the top right of this area labelled Clone or download, and then click Open in Desktop. Once the desktop app has opened you can select what path the project will be downloaded to by clicking "choose" next to the Local Path field. Once you click Clone, GitHub Desktop will download the file to your chosen location.
Now that everything is downloaded, all you have to do is run update.bat, which will download the node dependancies. If you are not on a windows system (or prefer the command line), you can navigate a command prompt window to the project's directory and run the command npm install. This part can take a little bit, so just be patient. If an error occurs at this step, it is because npm was not installed with node.js and you will have to re-run the node.js installer.
All you have to do now is edit the bills.txt file to contain the bills that you want to view. Each bill must be on a separate line, and be in the form [congress #] [hr/s] [bill number]. Once all the bills you want to view are inputted, run run.bat, or in the command line run node main.js. After the program completes, parsed information will be output in the file output.txt.
For example, a file reading
116 hr 195
Will result in the output
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Data from: http://www.govinfo.gov/bulkdata/BILLSTATUS/116/hr/BILLSTATUS-116hr195.xml
Bill hr195, Pay our Doctors Act of 2019
First presented by Rep. Mullin, Markwayne [R-OK-2]
Summary: Pay our Doctors Act of 201 9 This bill provides FY2019 appropriations to the Indian Health Service (IHS) if a joint resolution making continuing appropriations for FY2019 is not in effect. In the event of a partial government shutdown due to a lapse in appropriations, the bill provides continuing appropriations to the IHS at the same level that was provided for FY2018.
Assigned to the following committee(s): Appropriations Committee
The Last Action was: Referred to the House Committee on Appropriations.
This action was taken: 2019-01-03
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The default file contains a couple bills that I was given to test on and one invalid bill at the end to test the fail case.