Using Java in combination with Selenium WebDriver to interact with the previous page and target specific elements

Question

Using Java in combination with Selenium WebDriver to interact with the previous page and target specific elements

I am currently working on an application that requires the use of Selenium to navigate to the next page and verify if the required information is found. If the information is not found, then it needs to come back to the same page and proceed to click on the next user's information. This process continues until all users' links have been checked.

My approach involves creating a List of all the user links to iterate through using an enhanced for loop. However, I have encountered an issue where Selenium returns the exception 'org.openqa.selenium.StaleElementReferenceException: stale element reference: element is not attached to the page document' when trying to click on the second user link after coming back from the first one. I attempted to use the back() method but it did not work. Is there a workaround for this problem?

Thank you, Karim

java javascript selenium-webdriver

Answer 1

Answer №1

StaleElementReferenceException occurs when the DOM element has been recreated and destroyed during navigation back to a previous page.

To avoid this issue, it is recommended to extract all the href attributes of user links from the initial page and navigate to each link individually instead of attempting to click on them one at a time. This method can prevent the StaleElementReferenceException from being thrown consistently.

Below is an example of how to retrieve a list of all links on the page:

// Retrieve all links on the page
List<WebElement> listOfLinks = driver.findElements(By.tagName("a"));

// Extract the "href" attribute of each link and store them in a separate list
List<String> hrefLinks = new ArrayList<>();
for(WebElement link : listOfLinks) {
    hrefLinks.add(link.getAttribute("href"));
}

// Navigate through each link
for(int i = 0; i < hrefLinks.size(); i++) {
    driver.get(hrefLinks.get(i));
}

Answer 2

StaleElementReferenceException occurs when the DOM element has been recreated and destroyed during navigation back to a previous page.

To avoid this issue, it is recommended to extract all the href attributes of user links from the initial page and navigate to each link individually instead of attempting to click on them one at a time. This method can prevent the StaleElementReferenceException from being thrown consistently.

Below is an example of how to retrieve a list of all links on the page:

// Retrieve all links on the page
List<WebElement> listOfLinks = driver.findElements(By.tagName("a"));

// Extract the "href" attribute of each link and store them in a separate list
List<String> hrefLinks = new ArrayList<>();
for(WebElement link : listOfLinks) {
    hrefLinks.add(link.getAttribute("href"));
}

// Navigate through each link
for(int i = 0; i < hrefLinks.size(); i++) {
    driver.get(hrefLinks.get(i));
}

Answer 3

Answer №2

Here's an alternative approach that utilizes page objects:

int totalLinks = page.getUserLink().size();
NextPage nextPage;
for (int index = 0; index < totalLinks - 1; index++) {
  page.getUserLink().get(index).click();
  nextPage = new NextPage();
  if (nextPage.isDataAvailable()) {
    break;
  }
  driver.navigate().back();
  page = new Page();
}

Give it a shot with the necessary modifications!

Best regards.

Answer 4

Here's an alternative approach that utilizes page objects:

int totalLinks = page.getUserLink().size();
NextPage nextPage;
for (int index = 0; index < totalLinks - 1; index++) {
  page.getUserLink().get(index).click();
  nextPage = new NextPage();
  if (nextPage.isDataAvailable()) {
    break;
  }
  driver.navigate().back();
  page = new Page();
}

Give it a shot with the necessary modifications!

Best regards.

Answer 5

Answer №3

In order to address this issue, I devised a solution where the dynamically generated link prevented me from obtaining the href value. Instead, I captured the userid from the onclick attribute, added it to a list, and proceeded to create URLs for each user which would then open in the current browser window. Upon returning, I simply clicked on a link that navigated back to the original page.

Answer 6

In order to address this issue, I devised a solution where the dynamically generated link prevented me from obtaining the href value. Instead, I captured the userid from the onclick attribute, added it to a list, and proceeded to create URLs for each user which would then open in the current browser window. Upon returning, I simply clicked on a link that navigated back to the original page.

Using Java in combination with Selenium WebDriver to interact with the previous page and target specific elements

Answer №1

Answer №2

Answer №3

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