'Exception from HRESULT: 0X800A01B6' error in PowerShell when trying to enter login information to Facebook

Question

I have this code written in PowerShell:

$username = \"xxxxxx\";
$password = \"xxxxxx\";
$url = \"www.facebook.com/login\";

$ie = New-Object -com internetexp         


        

Answer 1

Workaround Always use the following methods instead of the native ones:

IHTMLDocument3_getElementsByTagName   
IHTMLDocument3_getElementsByName
IHTMLDocument3_getElementByID

Thanks to Paul Lim Here

Answer 2

This might happen as IE is still loading the page or parsing DOM. Try waiting for IE not to be busy before accessing page elements. A simple check for IE's Busy property will do. Like so,

$username="myname"
$password="mypass"
$url = "www.facebook.com/login"
$ie = New-Object -com internetexplorer.application
$ie.visible = $true
$ie.navigate($url)

# Sleep while IE is busy. Check 10 times per second, adjust delay as needed
while($ie.Busy) { Start-Sleep -Milliseconds 100 }

# IE is not busy with document anymore, pass credentials and click the logon    
($ie.document.getElementsByName("email") |select -first 1).value = $username
($ie.document.getElementsByName("pass") |select -first 1).value = $password
($ie.document.getElementsByName("login") |select -first 1).click()

Answer 3

use this:

$Url = "http://websiteurl"
$ie = New-Object -com internetexplorer.application;
$ie.visible = $true; # make to $true to see the result in webpage
$ie.navigate($Url);
while ($ie.Busy -eq $true) { Start-Sleep -Seconds 10; }
($ie.Document.IHTMLDocument3_getElementsByName("btnname") | select -first 1).click();
$ie.quit()