CODEWITHSUNDEEP
rubymechanize
user2239655
user2239655

Reputation: 840

Mechanize click on element

I have following html code. And I want to using Ruby Mechanize select dropdown element wit specific text (I want to click on it). Example Chinese. My question is how to do this? I am new in Mechanize.

<form class="form-inline search search-large" action="/translate" method="get">  
<input id="q" name="q" type="text" placeholder="Search" class="input-large" value="" autofocus="autofocus" data-pons-redirect-input="true" data-pons-autofocus="true" autocomplete="off">
<div class="btn-group source open" data-pons-lang="de">
  <button class="btn btn-large dropdown-toggle" data-toggle="dropdown">
    <span class="text">Chinese</span>
    <i class="icon-angle-down"></i>
  </button>
  <ul class="dropdown-menu">

        <li>
          <a href="#" class="language">
            <span class="text">Chinese</span>
            <span class="flag flag_zh"></span>
          </a> 
        </li>

        <li>
          <a href="#" class="language">
            <span class="text">Elvish</span>
            <span class="flag flag_lb"></span>
          </a> 
        </li>        
  </ul>
</div>
</form>

Upvotes: 2

Views: 1136

Answers (1)

Felix
Felix

Reputation: 4716

Bad News

As far as I see, your example page is too involved to let mechanize interface it with e.g. a .click method. Actually it will be able to follow the links (""), but I guess this will not help you much, because it seems there is some javascript or other black magic involved.

You can try first to see if the page will work nicely (not guaranteed) with mechanize by disabling JavaScript in your browser.

Good News

Anyway, at the end you will want mechanize to do certain kinds of HTTP requests - triggered by JS or not does not matter. That you will be able to do with mechanize (although it might not necessarily be the best choice for all scenarios).

Tips

I encourage you to use your browsers developer thing (often fired up by pressing F12) and see what is really happening, e.g. which form gets submitted with which values. And don't forget to check if its the same when used with and without javascript (mechanize will not execute JavaScript as far as i know).

Also, when developing your mechanize code, use irb or another repl like pry to try your code live. Your mechanize agent or page will have a method save or save_as or similar with which you can always save the current page and review it in your browser or favorite text editor. And remember _ in irb gives you your last return value.

Upvotes: 2

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