openstates-core

This repository contains the Open States data model and scraper backend.

Links

• Code of Conduct
• Contributing to Open States

Release steps

See RELASE.md

Debugging openstates-core code

Update command / scrapers

There are instructions on running a scraper here but what if you want to debug the command that wraps around the scraper code? This repository's update CLI module is the code that accepts parameters and actually executes the scraper (from openstates-scrapers). Another wrinkle is that the update command needs to be run inside the context of the openstates-scrapers repository, as it will attempt to load in the relevant scraper for the jurisdiction requested, and that import will fail if you try to run the code here within openstates-core.

Here's a recipe using PyCharm to successfully debug the update command:

Requirements to run code natively (not in docker)

• You need the gdal library installed on the host system. For me: sudo apt install gdal-bin python3-gdal
• openstates-core checked out at /home/username/repo/openstates/openstates-core/
• (let's assume you have made some changes in openstates-core that you want to test)
• openstates-scrapers checked out /home/username/repo/openstates/openstates-scrapers/
• Change directory to /home/username/repo/openstates/openstates-scrapers/
• Install required python version using the pyenv utility
• pip install poetry (if that python version doesn't already have it)

Debugging natively

• If you have previously installed the openstates dependency (eg openstates-core), then you need to run poetry remove openstates to clear that remotely-installed (from pypi) dependency. Each time you make a round of changes to openstates-core, you will need to remove and then re-add the dependency.
• poetry add ../openstates-core/ will add the openstates dependency from your local filesystem/local checkout
• poetry install
• In PyCharm, open the openstates-scrapers folder
• In PyCharm, set up a new run config:
  • type: python
  • module: openstates.cli.update
  • parameters: vi bills (or whatever you want to run)
  • working directory: /home/username/repo/openstates/openstates-scrapers/scrapers
• Run the run config in debug mode within PyCharm (eg the one working on openstates-scrapers). You can set breakpoints within both the scraper code AND in the openstates-core code. However you need to open (in PyCharm) the copy of openstates-core that poetry installed, which probably is in a location like: /home/username/.cache/pypoetry/virtualenvs/openstates-scrapers-93BMrPXy-py3.9/lib/python3.9/site-packages/openstates/cli/update.py

Reminder: when further changes are made to the openstates-core package locally, and you want to debug them again, you need to remove/re-add to update files in openstates-scrapers

• Change directory to /home/username/repo/openstates/openstates-scrapers/
• poetry remove openstates
• poetry add ../openstates-core/
• (you will need to re-establish breakpoints in any openstates-core files)