How to click a link using link text in nightwatch.js

Question

Say I have these elements on my web page.

<a href="/dynamic1">One</a> 
<a href="/dynamic2">Two</a> 
<a href="/dynamic3">Three</a>

I want to click on the link with text Two. How to identify or click that element using the Link Text without any unique attributes like id or class.

In .Net I can use driver.findElement(By.linkText("Images")).click();. What is the equivalent in nightwatch.js

Florent B. · Accepted Answer · 2018-03-22T11:33:54.410

11

The locator By.linkText uses an XPath internally.

So to click the second link from your example with an XPath :

.useXpath()     // every selector now must be XPath
.click("//a[text()='Two']")
.useCss()      // we're back to CSS now

Note that depending on the inner HTML, you may need to concatenate the children and trim the spaces:

.click("//a[normalize-space()='Some link']")

edited Mar 22 '18 at 11:33

answered Jul 23 '16 at 09:11

Florent B.

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1

This seems surprisingly difficult for something that I assume would be used quite a lot? ... You know - find a link with the text 'ABC' and click it. Or is it just me? – Zeth Jun 23 '19 at 15:45

score 4 · Answer 2 · answered Jul 23 '16 at 05:20

The first param to elements() method is the locator strategy, use link text - it is supported:

client
  .url('http://website.org')
  .waitForElementVisible('body', 1000)
  .elements('link text', 'Two', function (result) {

    for (var i = 0; i < result.value.length; i++) {
      var element = result.value[i];

      // do something
    }
  })
  .end();

Ben · Answer 3 · 2020-08-20T13:10:52.650

4

There is a better way now, you can use any of the documented locator strategies. Any one of; id, css selector, link text, partial link text, tag name, xpath.)

browser
  .click('link text', 'Some Link Text');

edited Aug 20 '20 at 13:10

answered Jul 31 '19 at 05:08

Ben

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score 3 · Answer 4 · answered Mar 12 '17 at 19:04

3

The only way that worked for me was using:

.useXpath()
.click("//*[contains(text(), 'Two')]")
.useCss()

answered Mar 12 '17 at 19:04

AndreVitorio

338
4
13

How to click a link using link text in nightwatch.js

4 Answers4

Linked