Using css child selector in ruby selenium-webdriver element find_elements

Question

I want to avoid using XPath where possible when finding elements in webdriver, but be able to reference child elements from already found elements e.g.

For the following html:

<div id="myelement">
    <table class="myclass">
       <tbody>
           <tr>
               <td>something</td>
               <td>
                   <table>
                       <tbody>
                           ...
                       </tbody>
                   </table>
               </td>
           </tr>
           <tr>
               ...
           </tr>
       </tbody>
    </table>
</div>

I have a css expression:

driver.find_elements('div#myelement table.myclass > tbody > tr')

I want to break this up into the table element and the rows, without having to refer back to the table expression. e.g. for XPath:

table = driver.find_element(:xpath, "//div[@id='myelement']//table[@classname='myclass']")

rows = table.find_elements(:xpath, 'tbody/tr')

I've tried the following, which works using JQuery $('div#myelement table.myclass').find('> tbody > tr')

table = driver.find_element(:css, 'div#myelement table.myclass')

rows = table.find_elements(:css, '> tbody > tr')

This causes an error `assert_ok': An invalid or illegal string was specified (Selenium::WebDriver::Error::UnknownError)

Removing the first '>' of course works, however means decendant tbody's are selected and not just immediate children.

How can I do this correctly using just css?

As mentioned above, it works, but I'd prefer not to use xpath for one-off issues. — Andy
– Andy, Commented Aug 25, 2013 at 14:04
@BillyChan the only purpose is so I can wrap the table in a PageObject (or at least a widget), and have the object handle the fetching of rows. I'm not really using webdriver as a test, but a robot to pull data from a website. — Andy
– Andy, Commented Aug 25, 2013 at 14:06

user229044 · Accepted Answer · 2013-08-26 19:44:21Z

5

As you don't give the page url,I took this Chinese language.Now I tried to find out the table column values for the second row of the first table having class name "wikitable sortable.

require 'selenium-webdriver'

driver = Selenium::WebDriver.for :firefox
driver.navigate.to "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_language"

table = driver.find_element(:css,"table.wikitable") # !> assigned but unused variable - table
tb_col = driver.find_elements(:css,"tr:nth-of-type(2)>td")
tb_col[0..5].each{|e| p e.text}
# >> "汉语／漢語 or 中文\nHànyǔ or Zhōngwén"
# >> "汉语"
# >> "中文"
# >> "Wu\nNotes: includes Shanghainese"
# >> "Wu; 吴/吳"
# >> "Wúyǔ"

The way you tried table.find_elements(:css, '> tbody > tr') is not valid css syntax in selenium-webdriver.It should be table.find_elements(:css, 'tbody > tr').I would suggest you to write this way:

table = driver.find_element(:css, 'div#myelement table.myclass>tbody')
rows = table.find_elements(:css, 'tr')

or jsfiddle

table = driver.find_element(:css, 'div#myelement table.myclass')
rows = table.find_elements(:css, 'tbody:nth-of-type(1) > tr')

edited Aug 26, 2013 at 19:44

user229044♦

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answered Aug 25, 2013 at 14:31

Arup Rakshit

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6 Comments

Andy Over a year ago

As mentioned in the question, table.find_elements(:css, 'tbody > tr') will select descendants and not just children, e.g. there may be another table inside that table, which shouldn't also be selected.

Arup Rakshit Over a year ago

try driver.find_element(:css, 'div#myelement table.myclass>tbody') and table.find_elements(:css, 'tr')

Andy Over a year ago

yes table.find_elements(:css, 'tbody:nth-of-type(1) > tr') will work I think, although not exactly the same meaning, but without me crawling webdriver server source to see if there's a way to have child selectors at the start, it's the best answer, so if you put that in a new answer, I'll accept it

Arup Rakshit Over a year ago

@Andy which one you want me to put as an answer... I am confused :(

Andy Over a year ago

table.find_elements(:css, 'tbody:nth-of-type(1) > tr'), you removed it from your comments

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