Finding a specific attribute, Selenium Xpath Java

Question

I have the below code that I am attempting to extract a specific attribute from(data-id). I am new to using selenium and have been pained by this for over a day now.

To add context to this I will give you a little background into what I am trying to achieve.

I have a webpage that has a auction, the auction has an ID, all items in the auction have unique ID's but all link to the original Auction ID. I am attempting to extract the "data-id" attribute of an element however I have yet to find out how. Here is a snippet of the code I am attempting to get the id from.

<div class="dropdown open">
  <a class="dropdown-toggle form-control" href="#" data-toggle="dropdown">
  <ul class="dropdown-menu dropdown-menu-form" role="menu">
    <li id="liAuction4c42556772376a443736343d">
      <label class="checkbox">
        <input id="chkAuction4c42556772376a443736343d" class="auction" type="checkbox" data-caption="09-10-2015 10:30:00" data-id="4c42556772376a443736343d" checked="checked"/>
09-10-2015 10:30:00
      </label>
    </li>
  </ul>
</div>

I have been on many forums and searched the whole of google and not found a solution that has worked for me yet otherwise I would not be posting the question and look like a complete Rookie.

I have attempted to use .getAttribute however I have had some issues with that and the code has never compiled, I guess I have not done something correctly.

String dataID = selenium.findElement(By.xpath("//*[starts-with(@id, 'liAuction')]")).getAttribute("data-id");

When I attempted the above the "findElement" part is underlined red and I have the following message,

"The method findElement(By) is undefined for the type Selenium".

If I change the parentisis around to look like this;

String dataID = selenium.findElement(By.xpath("//*[starts-with(@id, 'liAuction')]").getAttribute("data-id"));

"findElement" is no longer underlined, however now the ".getAttribute" part is underlined red and I have the following message, "The method getAttribute(String) is undefined for the type By"

I would really appreciate some assistance with this as I am about to throw my laptop out of the window, and I don't really want to lose all of my files.

Thanks in advance

Tony

drkthng · Accepted Answer · 2015-10-07 11:38:47Z

2

You can use the getAttribute method.

First find the input element, then extract the data-id:

WebElement inputElement = selenium.findElement(By.id("chkAuction4c42556772376a443736343d"));
String data-id = inputElement.getAttribute("data-id");

edited Oct 7, 2015 at 11:38

answered Oct 7, 2015 at 10:38

drkthng

7,0598 gold badges36 silver badges54 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

3 Comments

Tony II Over a year ago

Hi thank you for the quick response, I have attempted your suggestion but "driver" is underlined in red and is asking for a variable to be declared for it. Am I correct in assuming I should replace this with "selenium"? When I have replaced it I have the same problem described in my original post

Tony II Over a year ago

Sorry if this is a basic question but I am new to this and have not any idea yet

drkthng Over a year ago

haha, sorry, this is what is calle "selenium" in your code!, will update my answer ;-)

Shubham Jain · Accepted Answer · 2015-10-07 10:51:28Z

1

Use below xpath:-

//input[@id='chkAuction4c42556772376a443736343d']/@data-id

Then use:-

String dataID = selenium.findElement(By.xpath("//input[@id='chkAuction4c42556772376a443736343d']/@data-id")).gettext();

Full Code:-

static WebDriver driver=null;
    public static void main(String[] args) {
         driver = new FirefoxDriver();
         driver.get("URL");
         String dataID = driver.findElement(By.xpath("//input[@id='chkAuction4c42556772376a443736343d']/@data-id")).gettext();
         System.out.println(dataID);
}

Hope it will help you :)

edited Oct 7, 2015 at 10:51

answered Oct 7, 2015 at 10:25

Shubham Jain

17.8k17 gold badges88 silver badges135 bronze badges

3 Comments

Tony II Over a year ago

Hi thank you for this, I can see how this should work, however I have the same problem still, "findElement" is underlined red and tooltip message is "The method findElement(By) is undefined for the type Selenium". this has been my headache

Shubham Jain Over a year ago

I have updated my answer can you please try the full code. add your needed code in between it should work

Tony II Over a year ago

Thank you for this, Was not entirely the correct answer but pointed me to exactly what I wanted I used the following to the the data-id attribute. Your answer helped more than you know, Thank you again String dataID = selenium.getValue("//input[@id='chkAuction4c42556772376a443736343d']/@data-id");

Tony II · Accepted Answer · 2015-10-07 11:19:40Z

1

Thank you for your hekp with this guys, was not expecting to get the answer quite so quickly.

I needed to use the following line to retrieve the "data-id" attribute of an element.

String dataID = selenium.getValue("//input[@id='chkAuction4c42556772376a443736343d']/@data-id");

This ended up being alot easier that initially thought, I would like to thank @Shubham Jain for help with this his suggestion pointed me to where I needed to be.

I hope this helps others in the future

answered Oct 7, 2015 at 11:19

Tony II

291 silver badge9 bronze badges

Comments

Deepak_Mahalingam · Accepted Answer · 2015-10-07 11:06:55Z

0

Hi I suggest you to use the following code. It will work absolutely fine.

WebElement element = selenium.findElement(By.xpath("//input[@class='auction']"));
String dataId= element..getAttribute("data-id");

Detail

I'm identifing the object using following xpath //input[@class='auction'] and save it to an WebElement variable.

then By using getAttribute() im getting the string from data-id

answered Oct 7, 2015 at 11:06

Deepak_Mahalingam

4541 gold badge12 silver badges23 bronze badges

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

Finding a specific attribute, Selenium Xpath Java

4 Answers 4

3 Comments

3 Comments

Comments

Comments

Your Answer

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

4 Answers 4

3 Comments

3 Comments

Comments

Comments

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Related