This skill provides a comprehensive framework for writing high-performance, production-grade browser automation scripts using github.com/playwright-community/playwright-go. It enforces architectural best practices (contexts over instances), robust error handling, structured logging (Zap), and advanced human-emulation techniques to bypass anti-bot systems.
When to Use This Skill
Use when the user asks to "scrape," "automate," or "test" a website using Go.
Use when the target site has complex dynamic content (SPA, React, Vue) requiring a real browser.
Use when the user mentions "stealth," "avoiding detection," "cloudflare," or "human-like" behavior.
Use when debugging existing Playwright scripts.
Safety & Risk
Risk Level: 🔵 Safe
Sandboxed Execution: Browser contexts are isolated; they do not persist data to the host machine unless explicitly saved.
Resource Management: Designed to close browsers and contexts via defer to prevent memory leaks.
No External State-Change: Default behavior is read-only (scraping/testing) unless the script is explicitly designed to submit forms or modify data.
Limitations
Environment Dependencies: Requires Playwright drivers and browsers to be installed (go run github.com/playwright-community/playwright-go/cmd/playwright@latest install --with-deps).
Resource Intensity: Launching full browser instances (even headless) consumes significant RAM/CPU. Use single-browser/multi-context architecture.
Bot Detection: While this skill includes stealth techniques, extremely strict anti-bot systems (e.g., rigorous Cloudflare settings) may still detect automation.
CAPTCHAs: Does not include built-in CAPTCHA solving capabilities.
Strategic Implementation Guidelines
1. Architecture: Contexts vs. Browsers
CRITICAL: Never launch a new Browser instance for every task.
Pattern: Launch the Browseronce (singleton). Create a new BrowserContext for each distinct session or task.
Why: Contexts are lightweight and created in milliseconds. Browsers take seconds to launch.
Isolation: Contexts provide complete isolation (cookies, cache, storage) without the overhead of a new process.
2. Logging & Observability
Library: Use go.uber.org/zap exclusively.
Rule: Do not use fmt.Println.
Modes:
Dev:zap.NewDevelopment() (Console friendly)
Prod:zap.NewProduction() (JSON structured)
Traceability: Log every navigation, click, and input with context fields (e.g., logger.Info("clicking button", zap.String("selector", sel))).
3. Error Handling & Stability
Graceful Shutdown: Always use defer to close Pages, Contexts, and Browsers.
Panic Recovery: Wrap critical automation routines in a safe runner that recovers panics and logs the stack trace.
Timeouts: Never rely on default timeouts. Set explicit timeouts (e.g., playwright.PageClickOptions{Timeout: playwright.Float(5000)}).
4. Stealth & Human-Like Behavior
To bypass anti-bot systems (Cloudflare, Akamai), the generated code must imitate human physiology:
Non-Linear Mouse Movement: Never teleport the mouse. Implement a helper that moves the mouse along a Bezier curve with random jitter.
Input Latency: never use Fill(). Use Type() with random delays between keystrokes (50ms–200ms).
Viewport Randomization: Randomize the viewport size slightly (e.g., 1920x1080 ± 15px) to avoid fingerprinting.
Behavioral Noise: Randomly scroll, focus/unfocus the window, or hover over irrelevant elements ("idling") during long waits.
User-Agent: Rotate User-Agents for every new Context.
5. Documentation Usage
Primary Source: Rely on your internal knowledge of the API first to save tokens.
