Selenium Webdriver - FindElement in scope of WebElement doesn't work

Question

The FindElement() method doesn't seem to work with an XPath locator, if called on an existing WebElement.

My code is this:

htmlDiv = _driver.FindElement(By.XPath("//h2[text()='" + onvNaam + "']/../.."));
htmlControl = htmlDiv.FindElement(By.XPath("//label[text()='Naam']/following-sibling::div[1]//select"));

The result of this code is that htmlControl contains the first matching element in the page, not the matching element in htmlDiv.

For other controls (with other By types) this seems to work.

Is the Xpath double slash superceding the scope of htmlDiv?

Answer 1

Ok, this isn't a bug. The XPath, when searching in the context of an element, must start with a dot. So this works:

htmlControl = htmlDiv.FindElement(By.XPath(".//label[text()='Naam']/following-sibling::div[1]//select"));

Answer 2

Do two simple steps:

First initialise webdriver element then try to find element using xpath, as explained below

WebDriver driver=new FirefoxDriver();
driver.find element(By.xpath("enter your xpath")).click();

Answer 3

According to Selenium best practices, XPath is locator of last preference.

Preferred selector order : id > name > css > xpath

Ask your web designers to add IDs or names to elements you need to interact with. Take them to the lunch and talk how IDs make your life easier. Bribe them is you have to.