Encountering a StaleElementReferenceException when trying to navigate back in Selenium WebDriver

Question

Encountering a StaleElementReferenceException when trying to navigate back in Selenium WebDriver

My current challenge involves crawling through anchors within a web page using Selenium WebDriver. One approach I have considered is gathering the anchors in a list, clicking on each one, and then navigating backwards after each click. Below is the code snippet I am working with:

        WebDriver webDriver=new FirefoxDriver();
        webDriver.get(SEARCH_URL);
        WebElement form2=webDriver.findElement(By.id("frmMain"));
        form2.submit();
        System.out.println(webDriver.getCurrentUrl());
        List<WebElement>doctorAnchors=webDriver.findElements(By.xpath("//td[@class='data']/a"));
        int count=0;
        for(WebElement anchr:doctorAnchors){
            anchr.click();
            System.out.println((count++)+" : "+webDriver.getPageSource().toString());
            Thread.sleep(10000);
            webDriver.navigate().back();
        }

However, when trying to navigate backwards after clicking on an anchor, I encounter the following error:

Exception in thread "main" org.openqa.selenium.StaleElementReferenceException: Element not found in the cache - perhaps the page has changed since it was looked up
Command duration or timeout: 169 milliseconds

After researching similar issues on StackOverflow, I suspect that this error may be caused by JavaScript content on the page. This suspicion aligns with the fact that the page URL remains constant at http://www.somepage.com/dispatch regardless of the anchor clicked. While I can manually navigate back in the web browser opened by the driver, the webDriver.navigate().back() method fails. How can I successfully navigate back after clicking on a link? Is there a way to preserve the state of the driver before clicking and restore it afterwards?

java javascript selenium selenium-webdriver

Answer 1

Answer №1

Below is an illustration of a solution using the method getElementWithIndex. It has been tested and proven to work effectively.

In this particular scenario, it retrieves all links within a specified frame, class, or id, and sequentially navigates through each one.

driver.get("www.xyz.com");  
WebElement element = driver.findElement(By.id(Value));
List<WebElement> elements = element.findElements(By.tagName("a"));
int sizeOfAllLinks = elements.size();
System.out.println(sizeOfAllLinks);

for(int i=0; i<sizeOfAllLinks ;i++)
{
     System.out.println(elements.get(i).getAttribute("href"));
}

for (int index=0; index<sizeOfAllLinks; index++ )
{
     getElementWithIndex(By.tagName("a"), index).click();
     driver.navigate().back();
}

public WebElement getElementWithIndex(By by, int index)
{
     WebElement element = driver.findElement(By.id(Value));
     List<WebElement> elements = element.findElements(By.tagName("a")); 
     return elements.get(index);
}

Answer 2

Below is an illustration of a solution using the method getElementWithIndex. It has been tested and proven to work effectively.

In this particular scenario, it retrieves all links within a specified frame, class, or id, and sequentially navigates through each one.

driver.get("www.xyz.com");  
WebElement element = driver.findElement(By.id(Value));
List<WebElement> elements = element.findElements(By.tagName("a"));
int sizeOfAllLinks = elements.size();
System.out.println(sizeOfAllLinks);

for(int i=0; i<sizeOfAllLinks ;i++)
{
     System.out.println(elements.get(i).getAttribute("href"));
}

for (int index=0; index<sizeOfAllLinks; index++ )
{
     getElementWithIndex(By.tagName("a"), index).click();
     driver.navigate().back();
}

public WebElement getElementWithIndex(By by, int index)
{
     WebElement element = driver.findElement(By.id(Value));
     List<WebElement> elements = element.findElements(By.tagName("a")); 
     return elements.get(index);
}

Answer 3

Answer №2

Once you navigate away from the page, the reference to a specific element is lost as it is no longer part of the DOM. To overcome this issue, a simple solution is to retrieve the anchors again upon returning to the page. Essentially, count the number of anchors and use a loop to consistently fetch the anchor list and extract the required anchor from that list.

Answer 4

Once you navigate away from the page, the reference to a specific element is lost as it is no longer part of the DOM. To overcome this issue, a simple solution is to retrieve the anchors again upon returning to the page. Essentially, count the number of anchors and use a loop to consistently fetch the anchor list and extract the required anchor from that list.

Answer 5

Answer №3

        WebDriver driver=new FirefoxDriver();
            driver.get(SEARCH_URL);
            WebElement form=driver.findElement(By.id("frmMain"));
            form.submit();
            System.out.println(driver.getCurrentUrl());
            List<WebElement>links=driver.findElements(By.xpath("//td[@class='data']/a"));
            boolean flag = false;
            int count = links.size();
            for(int index=0; index<count; index++){
                if(flag){
                    links=driver.findElements(By.xpath("//td[@class='data']/a"));
                }
                element = links.get(index);

                element.click();
                System.out.println((index++)+" : "+driver.getPageSource().toString());
                Thread.sleep(10000);
                driver.navigate().back();
                flag = true;
                links = new ArrayList<WebElement>();
             }

This is how I approached the task at hand. :)

Answer 6

        WebDriver driver=new FirefoxDriver();
            driver.get(SEARCH_URL);
            WebElement form=driver.findElement(By.id("frmMain"));
            form.submit();
            System.out.println(driver.getCurrentUrl());
            List<WebElement>links=driver.findElements(By.xpath("//td[@class='data']/a"));
            boolean flag = false;
            int count = links.size();
            for(int index=0; index<count; index++){
                if(flag){
                    links=driver.findElements(By.xpath("//td[@class='data']/a"));
                }
                element = links.get(index);

                element.click();
                System.out.println((index++)+" : "+driver.getPageSource().toString());
                Thread.sleep(10000);
                driver.navigate().back();
                flag = true;
                links = new ArrayList<WebElement>();
             }

This is how I approached the task at hand. :)

Encountering a StaleElementReferenceException when trying to navigate back in Selenium WebDriver

Answer №1

Answer №2

Answer №3

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