# webframe: evaluated as a scraper and a sandbox

> Source: <https://simonwillison.net/2026/Oct/26/webframe-evaluation/>
> Published: 2026-10-26 16:15:00+00:00

**Research:** [webframe: evaluated as a scraper and a sandbox](https://github.com/simonw/research/tree/main/webframe-evaluation#readme)

[webframe](https://github.com/tractordev/webframe) is a neat little project from Jeff Lindsay which lets you "run a web page like a program" - you point it at a URL or file and it executes it in a hidden headless web view and outputs `console.log()` to standard output and any exceptions to standard error.

It's written in Go on top of the [glaze](https://github.com/crgimenes/glaze) library, which provides access to a system browser ("WKWebView on macOS, WebKitGTK on Linux, WebView2 on Windows") so it doesn't need to bundle its own browser engine.

It reminds me of my own [shot-scraper javascript](https://shot-scraper.datasette.io/en/stable/javascript.html) tool, albeit in a much smaller package that doesn't depend on Playwright.

I had Claude Opus 5.5 [put it through its paces](https://claude.ai/code/cshk_01MX3aJH8vDGmGSj1xH9BYhj2HviVvLDaJbiELHyDoReYT) and prepare a research report for me. Here's the prompt I used:

`Explore https://github.com/tractordev/webframe try running it and put it though its paces, build a few exploratory prototypes, then evaluate it as a potential sandboxing tool and as a tool for scraping web pages using the same patterns encouraged by the "shot-scraper JavaScript" command (see simonw/shot-scraper on GitHub, docs directory)`

Tags: [browsers](https://simonwillison.net/tags/browsers), [go](https://simonwillison.net/tags/go), [javascript](https://simonwillison.net/tags/javascript), [jeff-lindsay](https://simonwillison.net/tags/jeff-lindsay), [shot-scraper](https://simonwillison.net/tags/shot-scraper)