Select one xpath element based upon the position of another

Question

I want to select one html element based upon the position of another using xpath. For example:

<table>
    <tr>
        <th>
            Col1
        </th>
        <th>
            Col2
        </th>
        <th>
            Col3
        </th>
        <th>
            Col4
        </th>
    </tr>
    <tr>
        <td>
            Value1
        </td>
        <td>
            Value2
        </td>
        <td>
            Value3
        </td>
        <td>
            Value4
        </td>
    </tr>
</table>

In this example I want the td which is in the same position in the collection of tds that the th with the contents Col2 is.

I can find the position of the th

//th[contains(.,'Col2')]

I want to avoid doing this

//td[2]

Is there any way I can link the two?

har07 · Accepted Answer · 2016-04-14 12:42:53Z

4

This is one possible way :

//td[
    position() = count(//th[contains(.,'Col2')]/preceding-sibling::th)+1
 ]

xpathtester demo

The XPath returns td at position equals to position of the th. position of the th is calculated by counting number of preceding sibling th, +1 since XPath position index starts from 1.

edited Apr 14, 2016 at 12:42

answered Apr 14, 2016 at 11:32

har07

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