finding href link using Selenium and java

Question

I have some html code with href links. Some of them are as follows:

<a href="#">

while others are like

<a href = "http://.....'>.

In other words for an xpath I can't use //a[contains(@href,'#')] nor //a[contains(@href,'http')] because they are mutually exclusive and each would work only for certain different href values. There is not a universal string I can search for.

Now, theoretically, href should not be blank so if I could use something like //a[href not blank] that would be good. Or even //a[has href attribute].

Anyway to do that?

Tony, re-read your question. It seems like it is incomplete and could use some more information. — SunSparc
– SunSparc, Commented Sep 9, 2015 at 16:18
@SunSparc it's just that there were problems with HTML markup - fixed. — alecxe
– alecxe, Commented Sep 9, 2015 at 16:53

alecxe · Accepted Answer · 2015-09-09 16:53:01Z

2

If you want to check for a links to have the href attribute:

driver.findElements(By.xpath("//a[@href]"));

answered Sep 9, 2015 at 16:53

alecxe

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gtlambert · Accepted Answer · 2015-09-09 17:21:39Z

0

You could also check for specific instances of a tags using the XPath or operator:

driver.findElements(By.xpath("//a[@href='#' or starts-with(@href, 'http://')]")

This returns all anchor tags that have an href attribute equal to # or an href attribute that starts with http://.

This solution isn't as easy as the one from @alecxe, but it might give you more flexibility with your selections moving forwards. It also gives you the option to 'filter out' unwanted anchor tags. For example, this solution wouldn't return anchor tags with an href attribute that is a relative path eg href="path/to/another/webpage.html".

edited Sep 9, 2015 at 17:21

answered Sep 9, 2015 at 16:58

gtlambert

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2 Comments

Tony Over a year ago

don't I need an 'or' in there somewhere?

gtlambert Over a year ago

Actually, yes, agreed. See my edit. Can do it with either | or or.

JeffC · Accepted Answer · 2015-09-09 20:57:40Z

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I would use a simple CSS Selector that looks for an A tag that has an href attribute.

List<WebElement> elements = driver.findElements(By.cssSelector("a[href]"));

answered Sep 9, 2015 at 20:57

JeffC

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