Possible HtmlFindExpression bug

[Martin]

Hi

I think I have found a bug in the HtmlFindExpressions either that or I have stared my self completely blind on a obvious problem and in any case i need somebody to review and help :)

Problem:
I have a HtmlFindExpression that I belive should do the same as a XPATH I have created, the problem is that my XPATH works but my HtmlFindExpression only find 1 item(Expected 10). I have created some test code below and put some areas around the blocks.

Explation of areas:
Area1:
Finding elements with xpath which works as expected
Problem: none

Area2:
Finding elements with pure HtmlFindExpression.
Problem: Finds 1 element instead of 10

Area3:
Attempting to find the element by putting xpath inside a HtmlFindExpression.
Problem: Telerik throws error that it doesn't support hierarchal dependency in HtmlFindExpressions, but there isn't a hierarchal dependency in this xpath.

NOTE: Added a screenshot of the result i get.

Manager.LaunchNewBrowser(BrowserType.FireFox);

ActiveBrowser.NavigateTo("http://www.tradingfloor.com/topics/london-interbank-offered-rate");

Thread.Sleep(10000); // Didn't bother with a real wait.

ActiveBrowser.RefreshDomTree();


// Expected count is 10

// Area1
// Test with XPATH: This seems to work
Console.WriteLine("AREA1 ** START **");
string xpath = "//li[contains(@class,'postItem') and @data-url]";
ReadOnlyCollection<Element> collection = ActiveBrowser.Find.AllByXPath(xpath);
Console.WriteLine("XPATH find all as element count: " + collection.Count);
ReadOnlyCollection<HtmlListItem> collection1 = ActiveBrowser.Find.AllByXPath<HtmlListItem>(xpath);
Console.WriteLine("XPATH find all as HtmlListItem count: " + collection1.Count);
Console.WriteLine("AREA1 ** END **");

// Area2
// Test with HtmlFindExpression: This finds nothing
Console.WriteLine("AREA2 ** Start **");
HtmlFindExpression findExp = new HtmlFindExpression("tagname=li", "class=~postItem", "innermarkup=~data-url");
ReadOnlyCollection<Element> collection4 = ActiveBrowser.Find.AllByExpression(findExp);
Console.WriteLine("HtmlFindExpression find all as element count: " + collection4.Count);
ReadOnlyCollection<HtmlListItem> collection5 = ActiveBrowser.Find.AllByExpression<HtmlListItem>(findExp);
Console.WriteLine("HtmlFindExpression find all as HtmlListItem count: " + collection5.Count);
Console.WriteLine("AREA2 ** END **");

// Area3
// Test with XPATH inside HtmlFindExpression: This is misinterpreted
Console.WriteLine("AREA3 ** Start **");
HtmlFindExpression findExp1 = new HtmlFindExpression("xpath=//li[contains(@class,'postItem') and @data-url]");
ReadOnlyCollection<Element> collection2 = ActiveBrowser.Find.AllByExpression(findExp1);
ReadOnlyCollection<HtmlListItem> collection3 = ActiveBrowser.Find.AllByExpression<HtmlListItem>(findExp1);
Console.WriteLine("AREA3 ** END **");

[Anthony]

Hello Martin,

Thank you for the code and sample site.

Area 2
The Find Expression is using InnerMarkup. InnerMarkup returns the text content from the selected node, plus all markup in the selected node's children. You don’t get the selected node’s markup — only its text. You’ll get full markup for everything below the selected text.

I changed it to OuterMarkup and it correctly returned 10 elements:

HtmlFindExpression findExp = new HtmlFindExpression("tagname=li", "class=~postItem", "outermarkup=~data-url");

See here for more information on validation content element types.

Area 3
We're not sure why this isn't working as expected. I filed a bug on that error and you can find the PITS Issue here: Public URL. In the meantime just stick with the approach in Area 1.

Greetings,
Anthony
the Telerik team

[Martin]

Hi Anthony

Thanks for the input, changing to outermarkup seems to work, so it was just a case of my staring my self blind on the issue :).

Regarding area3:
It seems to actually work as well once I changed to outermarkup, my guess is HtmlFindExpressions sees innerMarkup as a heirarchy