Error: Unable to locate elements due to a null xpath expression in JavaScript

While testing a login page on a remote server, I encountered an error with Selenium that does not occur when testing the same code on a local server. This is puzzling to me since both servers have the exact same version of Selenium. Initially, I used:

browser.driver.findElement(By.xpath(desiredXpath)).click()

to click buttons. Then I attempted to create a method for performing click operations, using:

 browser.executeScript('arguments[0].click()', driver.findElement(By.xpath(desiredXpath)))

This line works flawlessly on the local server but fails on the remote server due to an inability to recognize the xpath, resulting in the error: WebDriverError: Cannot find elements when the xpath expression is null.

I added a console statement to print the xpath before this line executes, and it successfully displays the correct xpath for locating the element.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

javascriptseleniumselenium-webdriverjasmineprotractor

Answer №1

If you are looking for a way to ensure an element is present before interacting with it, consider using the following code snippet:

var elementToWaitFor = element(by.xpath(desiredXpath));
var ExpectedConditions = protractor.ExpectedConditions;

browser.wait(ExpectedConditions.presenceOf(elementToWaitFor), 5000);
elementToWaitFor.click();

// Alternatively, you can use browser.executeScript("arguments[0].click();", elementToWaitFor.getWebElement());

Answer №2

In my opinion ... Following is the observation I have made. I managed to replicate the described error by inserting null in xpath within the elementFinder passed as an argument in browser.executeScript

Executing the code below with a = null triggers the anticipated error

it('check', function () {
    browser.get("http://www.protractortest.org/");
    //var a = "//a[contains(@class,'github')]";
    var a = null;
    browser.executeScript('arguments[0].click()', element(by.xpath(a)))
});

Error Stack

  Stack:
    WebDriverError: Cannot find elements when the XPath expression is null.
        at WebDriverError (C:\Users\aditya\AppData\Roaming\npm\node_modules\protractor\node_modules\selenium-webdriver\lib\error.js:27:10)
        at Object.checkLegacyResponse (C:\Users\aditya\AppData\Roaming\npm\node_modules\protractor\node_modules\selenium-webdriver\lib\error.js:639:15)
        at parseHttpResponse (C:\Users\aditya\AppData\Roaming\npm\node_modules\protractor\node_modules\selenium-webdriver\http\index.js:538:13)
        at C:\Users\aditya\AppData\Roaming\npm\node_modules\protractor\node_modules\selenium-webdriver\http\index.js:472:11
...',
1 spec, 1 failure
Finished in 1.957 seconds

Potential Root Cause might be the variable desiredXpath being passed as null and using console.log() may not work due to it not aligning with protractor Control flow where other actions could occur

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