Message "org.openqa.selenium.InvalidSelectorException: invalid selector: Unable to locate an element with the XPath expression" using sendKeys

Question

I am having trouble trying to upload a file using Selenium. I am not able to use the sendKeys() function to pass the path due to the browse button not having an input tag. It's written in Angular.

Here's the browse button element:

<a id="attachmentUpload-browse0" name="attachmentUpload-browse0" ng-click="clickBrowse($index)" class="btn-pri" xpath="1"></a>

I did find an input tag right below the code above in the source, but I am getting errors when trying to use .sendKeys().

<input type="file" id="attachmentUpload-file0" name="attachmentUpload-file0" fileread="$parent.attachments[$index].fileData" class="attachmentUpload-inputfile ng-isolate-scope" onchange="angular.element(this).scope().onFileChange(this)" style="" xpath="1">

Edit: Error when using .sendKeys() to input tag

Exception in thread "main" org.openqa.selenium.InvalidSelectorException: invalid selector: Unable to locate an element with the xpath expression //input[@id="attachmentUpload-file0"]// because of the following error:
SyntaxError: Failed to execute 'evaluate' on 'Document': The string '//input[@id="attachmentUpload-file0"]//' is not a valid XPath expression.
*** Element info: {Using=xpath, value=//input[@id="attachmentUpload-file0"]//}
at sun.reflect.NativeConstructorAccessorImpl.newInstance0(Native Method)
at sun.reflect.NativeConstructorAccessorImpl.newInstance(NativeConstructorAccessorImpl.java:62)
at sun.reflect.DelegatingConstructorAccessorImpl.newInstance(DelegatingConstructorAccessorImpl.java:45)
at java.lang.reflect.Constructor.newInstance(Constructor.java:423)
at org.openqa.selenium.remote.ErrorHandler.createThrowable(ErrorHandler.java:214)
at org.openqa.selenium.remote.ErrorHandler.throwIfResponseFailed(ErrorHandler.java:166)
at org.openqa.selenium.remote.http.JsonHttpResponseCodec.reconstructValue(JsonHttpResponseCodec.java:40)
at org.openqa.selenium.remote.http.AbstractHttpResponseCodec.decode(AbstractHttpResponseCodec.java:80)
at org.openqa.selenium.remote.http.AbstractHttpResponseCodec.decode(AbstractHttpResponseCodec.java:44)
at org.openqa.selenium.remote.HttpCommandExecutor.execute(HttpCommandExecutor.java:158)
at org.openqa.selenium.remote.service.DriverCommandExecutor.execute(DriverCommandExecutor.java:83)
at org.openqa.selenium.remote.RemoteWebDriver.execute(RemoteWebDriver.java:545)
at org.openqa.selenium.remote.RemoteWebDriver.findElement(RemoteWebDriver.java:319)
at org.openqa.selenium.remote.RemoteWebDriver.findElementByXPath(RemoteWebDriver.java:421)
at org.openqa.selenium.By$ByXPath.findElement(By.java:361)
at org.openqa.selenium.remote.RemoteWebDriver.findElement(RemoteWebDriver.java:311)
at com.ibm.esh.o2c.art.Tester.runTest(Tester.java:61)
at com.ibm.esh.o2c.art.Tester.main(Tester.java:70)

Error when using a tag for attachmentUpload-browse0:

Exception in thread "main" org.openqa.selenium.WebDriverException: unknown error: cannot focus element

Update the question with the error stack trace you see while using the <input> tag — undetected Selenium
– undetected Selenium, Commented Apr 18, 2018 at 20:13
Will do. May take a bit. Selenium is acting very strange over past hour, page loads are taking forever. I see "Connecting" on bottom of browser for 2 minutes (loads in Chrome normally nearly instant). Was not having that issue in the days prior. — user3413540
– user3413540, Commented Apr 18, 2018 at 20:15
Try to use only driver.findElement(By.xpath("//input[@id='attachmentUpload-file0']")); element.sendKeys("test"); — undetected Selenium
– undetected Selenium, Commented Apr 18, 2018 at 20:43
That appeared to work. driver.findElement(By.xpath("//input[@id='attachmentUpload-file0']")).sendKeys(System.getProperty("user.dir")+"/test1.csv"); Thank you so much. — user3413540
– user3413540, Commented Apr 18, 2018 at 21:03

Peter Mortensen · Accepted Answer · 2019-04-23 13:54:19Z

3

This error message...

org.openqa.selenium.InvalidSelectorException: invalid selector: Unable to locate an element with the xpath expression //input[@id="attachmentUpload-file0"]// because of the following error:
SyntaxError: Failed to execute 'evaluate' on 'Document': The string '//input[@id="attachmentUpload-file0"]//' is not a valid XPath expression.

...implies that your XPath expression was not a valid one.

You can use the following line of code:

driver.findElement(By.xpath("//input[@id='attachmentUpload-file0']")).sendKeys("test");

edited Apr 23, 2019 at 13:54

Peter Mortensen

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answered Apr 18, 2018 at 21:09

undetected Selenium

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