Can we use xpath-selector for finding web elements?

Help
1

I see references to using CSS selectors to find web elements like:

webctrl css-selector=‘something’

Does the same thing work with XPath??

webctrl xpath-selector=‘something’

1 Like
2

Tried it myself and it appears that we cannot:

WORKS: css-selector=‘input[name=“POLN”]’

DOESN’T WORK: xpath-selector=‘//input[@name=“POLN”]’

3 Likes
3

Are you able to see xpath selectors in uiexplorer?

4

I didn’t try that. I just added it to an activity to see if it would work.

I come from a test automation background and we use both CSS and XPath all day long to locate & interact with elements. That’s why UIPath has been frustrating. It’s a paradigm shift.

5

I agree with Bryan. being an automation engineer, we tweak the selectors the way we want it. UiPath with Regular expressions such as * and ? does not take us far in identiying the unique selectors all the time.

if two unique elements start with ember1234 and ember 2345 to identify two different dropdowns, using ember* always finds the first occurance. Is there any advantage UiPath developers see by restricting to CSS selectors alone?

@octechnologist - Can you share some examples of CSS selectors to tweak with name or id or li etc. I believe these are helpful for the whole community.

Appreciate your efforts in developing the UiPath course on Udemy, I really enjoyed it. Looking forward to advanced topics on UiPath. Good day, Suresh

2 Likes
6

Hi @sparimi

Support for xpath selectors has been recognized as one of the possible future features. I’m sure it will make its way to the Studio at some point :slight_smile:

1 Like
7

@loginerror - Thank you for considering that. We are excited to use that as and when it is available::heart_eyes:

I would love to hear more on xpaths.

Any possibilities to introduce the native tool to craft and test the Xpaths in UI Studio or allow already available extensions to add the studio. Such as Firebug for Firefox, Chropath for chrome page modeller for chrome. These extensions made life easy while crafting the xpaths for developers. Just a thought

1 Like
8

Hi All,
Is that introduced now in UiPath…? Please let me know if anyone used x path selector to interact with web element.
Thanks in Advance.

Regards,
Senthil V.

9

I am really stuck in an situation where the drop down menu is vanishing when out of focus and the UIExplorer is failing badly - “Index Out of range”.

I tried with Chrome DevTool and get the xpath of the element:
//*[@id="ctl00_TopMenun2"]/table/tbody/tr/td/a

But now I am really stuck, has anyone able to get the XPath thing work?

Also, the tag is as below:

<a class="ctl00_TopMenu_1 topMenu globalMenuItem ctl00_TopMenu_3" href="/ONB/Reports.aspx" style="border-style:none;font-size:1em;">Reports</a>

Can anyone please help me forming a selector here, please please !

10

did you try to work with xpath in uipath studio?
[RajeshSwarnkar]

12

Has this feature been introduced now?

13

@Mayank_Kumar

Hello Mayank,

welcome in the UiPath Community.

As alternative you can use the HTML Activity Pack to use XPath.

Best regards
Stefan

14

Is this feature completed?

15

Hi all, is there any update on this?