python, selecting a textbox with selenium

python, selenium

Solution

try

driver.find_element_by_id("tinymce")

Elements in HTML Forms have name attribute, that is what you tried to match with `find_element_by_name`.

If you have a form like

<form>
First name: <input type="text" name="firstname"><br>
Last name: <input type="text" name="lastname">
</form>

You could match the input for first name with `find_element_by_name('firstname')`, but that's not what you want to do right now.

The element you want to select looks like this

<body id="tinymce" class="mceContentBody " contenteditable="true" onload="window.parent.tinyMCE.get('tinymcewindow').onLoad.dispatch();" spellcheck="false" dir="ltr">

So you can

- `find_element_by_id("tinymce")`

- `find_element_by_css_selector("#tinymce")`

- `find_element_by_xpath("//*[@id='tinymce']")`

- ...

... and for the sake of completeness ...

Once you have selected this element, you can fill it with

`driver.find_element_by_id("tinymce").send_keys("Hello world")`

EDIT:

Sometimes people don't realise that selecting an element works within the context of current page. If your content is inside an iframe, you need to switch to this iframe first.

`driver.switch_to_frame("frameName")`

Then you can go back with `driver.switch_to_default_content()`

See Selenium Python - Navigating

Problem

I am trying to enter some text into a textarea with selenium. Inspection of the source reveals the following about the textareas code.. my text should be entered where it says "Text goes here": ``` <iframe id="tinymcewindow_ifr" frameborder="2" src="javascript:""" allowtransparency="true" title="Rich Text AreaPress ALT-F12 for toolbar. Press ALT-0 for help" style="width: 90%; height: 90px; display: block;"> #document <!DOCTYPE > <html> <head xmlns="http://www.site.org/xhtml"> … </head> <body id="tinymce" class="mceContentBody " contenteditable="true" onload="window.parent.tinyMCE.get('tinymcewindow').onLoad.dispatch();" spellcheck="false" dir="ltr"> <p> … </p> </body> </html> </iframe> ``` When I try and select the textarea with some command like: ``` driver.find_element_by_name("tinymce") ``` it returns an error message like this; ``` File "/usr/local/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/selenium/webdriver/remote/webdriver.py", line 293, in find_element_by_name return self.find_element(by=By.NAME, value=name) File "/usr/local/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/selenium/webdriver/remote/webdriver.py", line 681, in find_element {'using': by, 'value': value})['value'] File "/usr/local/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/selenium/webdriver/remote/webdriver.py", line 164, in execute ... ``` the command: ``` driver.find_element_by_id("tinymce") ``` Gives this error message: ``` File "/usr/local/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/selenium/webdriver/remote/webdriver.py", line 197, in find_element_by_id return self.find_element(by=By.ID, value=id_) File "/usr/local/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/selenium/webdriver/remote/webdriver.py", line 681, in find_element {'using': by, 'value': value})['value'] File "/usr/local/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/selenium/webdriver/remote/webdriver.py", line 164, in execute ... ``` How does one select a textbox like this with Selenium?

Original source