How to Identify Web Elements Using Selenium Xpath and name

How to find element by Name in selenium

Elements do not necessarily have ID attributes on all of them. Elements can be have names that we can use to locate them uniquely. 

In the  image you will find value of the name attribute  of the google search text box is "q".
name is unique for this page.

Now we will write down java selenium code to uniquely identify the web element

WebDriver driver = new FirefoxDriver();
WebElement we = driver.findElement(By.name("q"));

Now we can write down the values in the search text box like below method.

we.sendKeys("selenium:);

How to find element by Xpath in selenium

Before start this topic we need to know what is xpath and how to build the xpath. Most of the time we are using xpath generator tool like Firebug , chrome developer tool ,but sometime we can not solely depend on those tool . We need to design xpath manually to overcome the complex situation.

If we look the the below link we will see there is a situation where we cant not use xapth generator tool directly because need to to use different function to handle the situation.

https://blogs.oracle.com/rajeshthekkadath/entry/xpath_searching_for_a_text


Please study xpath tutorial to learn what is xpath and how to build the xpath . I am providing few links which will give you a snapshot of the xpath.

i. http://www.w3schools.com/xsl/xpath_intro.asp
ii. http://www.tutorialspoint.com/xpath/
iii. https://www.seleniumeasy.com/selenium-tutorials/xpath-tutorial-for-selenium

How to use xpath in scrip


Sample code

WebDriver driver = new FirefoxDriver();

driver.findElement(By.xpath("//*[@id='BLUE_BAR_ID_DO_NOT_USE']/div/div/div[1]/div/div/ul/li[12]/a/span/span")).click();

Selenium Locators

Very basic question what is the locator in selenium, Locators allows us to find elements on a page that can be used in our test.  Actually we need to uniquely identify one element from HTML page where we can do operation like click, select, sendKeys etc.
Selenium webdriver provide us various mechanism to uniquely identify one element from HTML.

1.  Locate elements by ID
2.  Locate elements by Name
3.  Locate elements by Link
4.  Locate elements by Xpath
5.  Locate elements by Css
6.  Locate elements by DOM
7.  Locate elements by PartialLink

Before starting we should begain by making sure that we have all the relevant application installed. While there are not fullproof , they will give us clue how to construct the locator for our test page.


Firefox browser:

1. Firebug: This is a Firefox addon and it allows developer to find elements on the page.

Firebug is available in firefox addon section

2. Firepath :

Firepath is available in Firefox addon section.

IE browser:

1. IE Developer tool: This is in build feature for IE ,we can launch by pressing F12.

Chrome:

1. Google chrome developer tool: Like IE this is also in build tool for chrome. By  pressing F12 we can use this tool. We can generate Xpath ,css path using this tool.

Xapth or css path generation

Now start with locate element by ID

On web application element should have an ID for all there controls on the page. ID should be the unique for that page.

How to find element by ID in selenium 

In the  image you will find the ID of the google search text box.  id="lst-ib".
ID is unique for this page.

Now we will write down java selenium code to uniquely identify the web element (In selenium all web component is a web element) and we will operate on this web element.

Here we are assuming we using Firefox browser

WebDriver driver = new FirefoxDriver();
WebElement we = driver.findElement(By.id("st-ib"));
we.sendKeys("selenium:);

In my next post I will cover below items

1.  Locate elements by Name
2.  Locate elements by Link
3.  Locate elements by Xpath

Selenium Installation process

Hi this is my first post on selenium . lets start with definition of selenium and then the installation process. My complete tutorial based on selenium java.  

What is Selenium?

Selenium is a free (open source) automated testing suite for web applications across different browsers like google chrome, firefox IE,  opera and safari .It also run on different OS like windows, Linux, mac. It is quite similar to UFT (HP) previously it was QTP, but selenium works only on web application. 

Installation : 

1.  Install java sdk  from oracle  website on your computer. 

Download java sdk based on your OS and the architecture like 32 bit or 64 bit . 

2. Install the java.  

3. Set the java path.  Please follow the instruction how to set the java path in your system. 

http://www.javatpoint.com/how-to-set-path-in-java

4.  Download selenium jars from here. 

      i. Selenium Standalone Server

      ii. java

5.  Extract java jars.  

6 . Download JAVA IDE like eclipse . In my selenium tutorial I will use eclipse because it is easy to use.  You can download eclipse from here. 

7. Create a new project through File > New > Java Project. Name the project as "newproject".

8.A new pop-up window will open enter details as follow

     i. Project Name
     ii. Location to save project
     iii. Select an execution JRE
     iv. Select layout project option
     v. Click on finish button

9. Now selenium WebDriver's into Java Build Path

In this step,

i.   Right-click on "newproject" and select Properties.
ii.  On the Properties dialog, click on "Java Build Path".
iii. Click on the Libraries tab, and then
iiv. Click on "Add External JARs.."

Now your project is ready to use as a selenium test.

Thanks to read my blog . Please let me know if you have any query on selenium installation process . I will try to solve the query.


In my next tutorial I will explain selenium locators and how to user different locator in script.