Selenium sendKeys are not sending all characters

Question

I'm using Java, Selenium, and Chrome for test automation. Our developers recently upgraded our UI from AngularJS to Angular2 (not sure if that matters). But since then, sendKeys is inputting incomplete characters in to the text field. Here's an example:

    public void enterCustomerDetails()
    {   
        txtFirstName.sendKeys("Joh201605130947AM");
        txtSurname.sendKeys("Doe201605130947AM");
        txtEmail.sendKeys("johndoe@gmail.com");
    }

I also tried using executeScript. It didn't work. It can enter complete characters but the form thinks the field is null.

public void forceSendKeys(WebElement element, String text)
{
    if (element != null)
        ((JavascriptExecutor) this.webDriver).executeScript("arguments[0].value=arguments[1]", element, text);
}

public void enterCustomerDetails()
        {   
            forceSendKeys(txtFirstName, "Joh201605130947AM");
            forceSendKeys(txtSurname, "Doe201605130947AM");
            forceSendKeys(txtEmail, "johndoe@gmail.com");
        }

I also tried using .click() before .sendKeys and adding in sleep time. They didn't work too.

I got an idea to enter the characters 1 by 1 from this post: How to enter characters one by one in to a text field in selenium webdriver?

It worked but that means I have to rewrite all my codes from sendKeys to the new function:

    public void sendChar(WebElement element, String value)
{
    element.clear();

    for (int i = 0; i < value.length(); i++){
        char c = value.charAt(i);
        String s = new StringBuilder().append(c).toString();
        element.sendKeys(s);
    }       
}

public void enterCustomerDetails()
    {
        sendChar(txtFirstName, "Joh201605130947AM");
        sendChar(txtSurname, "Doe201605130947AM");      
        sendChar(txtEmail, "johndoe@gmail.com");
    }

If you guys know a better way, please help! :)

Answer 1

I assume this is caused by this Angular2 issue https://github.com/angular/angular/issues/5808

Angular can't process input events when they arrive too fast.

As a workaround you would need to send single characters with a small delay between each.

Answer 2

I stumbled upon this error when doing integration tests with NightwatchJS (which uses selenium).

So I'm writing this for people coming here in the future.

I wrote this extension command for nightwatch:

exports.command = function (selector, value, using) {
    var self = this;
    self.elements(using || 'css selector', selector, function (elems) {
        elems.value.forEach(function (element) {
            for (var c of value.split('')) {
                self.elementIdValue(element.ELEMENT, c);
            }
        });
    });
    return this;
};

Which can be used in this way:

var username = 'integration@test.com';
browser.setValueSlow('input[ngcontrol=username]', username); //Works with ng2!

This issue was also discussed on NightwatchJS's github here

Answer 3

I was getting this error too in Java, Selenium. You might also be getting this error too while writing your codes - "sendKeys (CharSequence) from the type Webelement refers to the missing type charSequence"

I tried varying the wait time and even typing extra characters before the main characters, they did not work.

The simple trick I used was to change the Java Compiler version from JRE 9 to JRE 10.

Answer 4

This is due to a bug in Angular apps. Workaround is to put a sleep function.

public void setText(By element, String text) {
    sleep(100); // Angular version < 2 apps require this sleep due to a bug
    driver.findElement(element).clear();
    driver.findElement(element).sendKeys(text);
}

Answer 5

try this code.. other way to set values using javascript WebDriver driver = new FirefoxDriver(); JavascriptExecutor jse = (JavascriptExecutor)driver; jse.executeScript("document.getElementsByName('body')[0].setAttribute('type', 'text');"); driver.findElement(By.xpath("//input[@name='body']")).clear(); driver.findElement(By.xpath("//input[@name='body']")).sendKeys("Ripon: body text");