Type mismatch: cannot convert from void to WebElement

Question

import org.openqa.selenium.WebDriver;
import org.openqa.selenium.WebElement;
import org.openqa.selenium.support.ui.ExpectedConditions;
import org.openqa.selenium.firefox.FirefoxDriver;
import java.util.concurrent.TimeUnit;
import org.openqa.selenium.By;

public class className {

    public static void main(String[] args) throws InterruptedException {
        WebDriver driver;
        System.setProperty("webdriver.geckodriver" , "F:\\geckodriver-v0.15.0-win64\\geckodriver.exe");
        driver = new FirefoxDriver();
        driver.get("<URL>");
        driver.findElement(By.id("<first field>")).click();

          //This line through the error
        WebElement a= driver.findElement(By.id("<id>")).sendKeys("<abc>");

        driver.findElement(By.id("<second field>")).click();
        driver.findElement(By.id("<field name")).sendKeys("<xyz>");
        driver.manage().timeouts().implicitlyWait(15, TimeUnit.SECONDS);
    }

}

in this program, the following line throws an error as Type mismatch: cannot convert from void to WebElement.

New to automation. Help is greatly needed

Answer 1

This error is thrown because of the in the following line

WebElement a= driver.findElement(By.id("<id>")).sendKeys("<abc>");

You are declaring a variable of type WebElement here, but calling sendKeys() method which returns void. Remove the sendKeys() method call from the line.

Write the code like -

WebElement a = driver.findElement(By.id("<id>"));
a.sendKeys();

Answer 2

Issue has already been resolved but still the issue that you will be getting is due to the firefox driver.

Trying using gecko driver and set the properties as:

System.setProperty("webdriver.gecko.driver" , "F:\\geckodriver-v0.15.0-win64\\geckodriver.exe");