What is XPath?

XPath (XML Path Language) is a query language and expression syntax used for navigating and selecting elements from XML (Extensible Markup Language) documents.

1. It provides a way to locate and retrieve information from XML documents by specifying the path to the desired elements or nodes.
2. XPath uses a compact and expressive syntax to describe the structure and relationships within an XML document.
3. It operates on the logical structure of the XML document, treating it as a tree of nodes.

Syntax:

//tagname[@attribute = ‘value’]

Use cases of XPath include:

1. Selecting Nodes: XPath expressions can be used to select specific nodes or sets of nodes within an XML document.
2. Filtering Nodes: XPath allows you to filter nodes based on certain conditions, such as attributes or content.
3. Navigation: XPath provides a way to navigate through the hierarchical structure of an XML document, moving from one node to another.
4. Accessing Attributes: You can use XPath to access and retrieve values of attributes associated with elements.
5. Searching for Patterns: XPath supports the use of wildcards and patterns to find nodes that match a specific structure or naming convention.

Web application testing must be rigorous and thorough. For this reason, many tests for web applications are automated. Selenium is an open-source framework that allows us to automate web browser testing. In the following article, we will explore how to use XPath to locate elements on our HTML code using Java and Selenium. We will further see an example of how we can manipulate these elements using the code itself.