Web Secretary

Web Secretary is an impressive web page monitoring software that goes beyond the usual functionalities provided by similar software. It leverages content analysis to detect changes and ensures that it's not only the HTML that changes but the actual content. With this tool, you can indicate what to disregard on the pages, such as hit counters, and receive an email with the modified document or load the highlighted page in your browser.

This software comprises two Perl scripts: websec and webdiff. Websec retrieves web pages and emails them to you based on a URL list you provide, while webdiff compares two web pages, the current and archive, and generates a new page using the current page with all differences highlighted in a predefined color.

For instance, the Web Secretary page has the following: Old Page, which is the original page before the change; Modified Page, which is the page after the change, and Highlighted Page which is the page as WebSec sends it, highlighted. Personally, I use crontab to install Web Secretary to monitor a large number of web pages. When the highlighted pages arrive, I use procmail to sort them out and file them into another folder. When I am too busy to access the web for a few days, I use Web Secretary to archive the pages, and I can access them at my leisure.

The system requirements to run this software include Perl 5 and LWP module. Installation is straightforward; download and unpack the archive, modify the configuration file as you wish. Note that there is no GUI to configure the program; everything is in the text files. In conclusion, Web Secretary is a fantastic software that you should try if you are looking for an efficient way to monitor multiple web pages.