How to pull a changing class name with Python and Selenium?

Question

I'm testing my web scraping skills with Python and Selenium and I found an button with a changing "id" "ember" and the numbers change everytime. Everything else is the same as all buttons. The only thing that's unqiue is

<button aria-label="View only People results" id="ember697" class="search-vertical-filter__filter-item-button artdeco-button artdeco-button--muted artdeco-button--2 artdeco-button--tertiary ember-view" type="button"><!---->
<span class="artdeco-button__text">
    People
</span></button>

I've tried all the methods so far (i.e., id, CSS_selector, xpath, etc.).
[![Linked In button][1]][1]

Here's the error I keep getting no matter what I select.

selenium.common.exceptions.NoSuchElementException: Message: no such element: Unable to locate element

So, do you want to search by aria-label, class, or something else? — Ayush Garg
– Ayush Garg, Commented Mar 8, 2020 at 23:41
@AMC, I edited the original post. I get a no such element exception error. — Brandon Jacobson
– Brandon Jacobson, Commented Mar 9, 2020 at 0:07
@BrandonJacobson Please provide the entire error message, as well as a minimal reproducible example. — AMC
– AMC, Commented Mar 9, 2020 at 0:35

Ayush Garg · Accepted Answer · 2020-03-09 00:09:19Z

2

So, since you want to search through aria-label, you can use an XPATH:

driver.find_elements_by_xpath("//button[@aria-label='View only People results']")

EDIT: You could also use a css selector like this:

driver.find_elements_by_css_selector("button[aria-label='View only People results'']")

answered Mar 9, 2020 at 0:09

Ayush Garg

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1 Comment

Brandon Jacobson Over a year ago

The xpath suggestion worked. When I hit inspect, then copy xpath, it doesn't give me the syntax you provided. I guess I have to learn more about Selenium's syntax. Thanks!!!

Amruta · Accepted Answer · 2020-03-09 03:14:04Z

2

Try this: option1 - i am assuming ember will be there and only numbers are changing

driver.find_elements_by_xpath("//*[starts-with(@id, 'ember')]")

option 2-

driver.find_elements_by_xpath("//*[contains(@id, 'ember')")

option 3-

driver.find_elements_by_xpath("//*[contains(@class, 'search-vertical-filter__filter-item-button')")

Hope it helps you.

answered Mar 9, 2020 at 3:14

Amruta

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1 Comment

Brandon Jacobson Over a year ago

So, there are multiple buttons with the ember id. I didn't know you can do "starts-with" though. Thank you so much. I guess I still have more to learn about the Selenium syntax.

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