GIG UPLOADER

Automate gig promotion by programmatically submitting to multiple online event services. User inputs details into a local .xls spreadsheet, and the data is uploaded publicly to Songkick, BandsInTown, Strumsy, and privately to Dubsado. Further integration propagates this information to Spotify, Google, a user's Google Calendar, and many more locations.

PROBLEM:

Each service has a different gig submission interface and process requiring multiple clicks and repetitive typing of the same information. Worse, many don't provide any option to bulk-upload multiple gigs at once.

SOLUTION:

Write some code that does it automatically!

PROCESS:

• Read in gigs from a local, user supplied excel (.xls) file.
• Create headless browser and log in each service. Username and Password MUST be supplied by the user in their private, local config.py file.
• Iterate over all gigs and manually submit gig info.
• If venue doesn't exist on the service's venue database, GigUploader will create a new venue. It will then keep retrying to add the gig at that venue until the venue appears in the database (sometimes up to a minute).
• If the band already has a gig that day but at a different time/venue, the services may question you. GigUploader assumes it's correct (that you have 2 shows the same day) and continues to submit the second gig.
• If the gig has already been added (same date/time/venue) you may be alerted; GigUploader does NOT add the duplicate gig.

FUTURE IDEAS:

• Create a deployed React user interface, and run Python script on a deployed backend server, allowing use of the app from anywhere.
• Integrate Google OAuth to secure sensitive user information. Ideally store user details on their own local computer in HTTP-only cookies, eliminating need to store user info in our database.

SETUP AND OPERATION:

• be sure you have Python and git installed on your computer
• clone this repo to your local machine; open terminal (or other command line interface) and enter git clone https://github.com/benhammondmusic/giguploader.git
• open the bit-upload.xls in Excel or other spreadsheet program. The top row is a header row; keep it. GigUploader expects all info in "string" form (plain text) EXCEPT the start time field which should be typed into Excel as HH:MM
• edit config.py using your favorite text editor (VSCode is hot right now) and store your username/email and password information
• run the Python script in your terminal with python gig_submitter.py
• watch as Chrome automagically flies through your gig submission process; saving you time and frustration!

KNOWN ISSUES:

• Websites frequently alter their code, therefor this (and any other web-scraping process) is extremely fragile. It may require some baby-sitting and adjustments to keep it functional. Further, web-scraping in general is ethically nebulous, and may be illegal in some situations. It is up to you to confirm you are operating this script in a way that doesn't harm others.