How to use the XPath axes method in Selenium

XPath is a query language used for choosing nodes from an XML document. The link between the current context node and the destination node we wish to find in the DOM axes represent a hierarchy.

Note: See XPath to find out more about it.

List of axes

Axes and Their Functionalities

Name	Functionality
`parent`	It identifies the current node’s parent.
`child`	It selects the children of the current node that are on the same level.
`ancestor`	It is the current node’s ancestor (grandparents, parents, etc.) till the root node is selected
`descendant`	It selects all the current node’s descendants until the leaf node has no children.
`following`	It selects all the incoming nodes after the current node, except the attribute and descendants.
`following-sibling`	It selects all the same level nodes after the current node, having the same parent.
`preceding`	It selects all the previous nodes from the current node except the attribute and ancestors.
`preceding-sibling`	It selects all the same level nodes before the current node, having the same parent.
`self`	It selects the current node

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<body>
	<div class="TransportingVehicles" align="center">
		<h2>Transporting Vehicles</h2>
		<div class="ByLand" align="left">
			<h3 align="left">Vehicles transportation by Land </h3>
			<div class="Jeep">
				<h4>Jeep</h4>
			</div>
			<div class="Cyle">
				<h4>Cyle</h4>
			</div>
			<div class="Truck">
				<h4>Truck</h4>
			</div>
		</div>
		<div class="ByAir">
			<h3>Vehicles transportation by Air </h3>
			<div class="Airplane">
				<h4>Airplane</h4>
			</div>
			<div class="Jet">
				<h4>Jet</h4>
			</div>
			<div class="Helicopter">
				<h4>Helicopter</h4>
			</div>
		</div>
		<div class="ByWater">
			<h3>Vehicles transportation by Water </h3>
			<div class="Boat">
				<h4>Boat</h4>
			</div>
			<div class="Submarine">
				<h4>Submarine</h4>
			</div>
			<div class="Ship">
				<h4>Ship</h4>
			</div>
		</div>
	</div>
</body>
</html>

import time
from selenium import webdriver
from selenium.webdriver.common.by import By
from selenium.webdriver.support.ui import WebDriverWait
from selenium.webdriver.support import expected_conditions as EC
from webdriver_manager.chrome import ChromeDriverManager
from selenium.webdriver.chrome.options import Options
from selenium.webdriver.chrome.service import Service

options = Options()
options.add_argument('--no-sandbox')
options.add_argument('--disable-dev-shm-usage')
prefs = {"download.default_directory": "."}
options.add_experimental_option("prefs", prefs)
browser = webdriver.Chrome(service=Service(ChromeDriverManager().install()), options=options)

BASE_URL = "https://www.facebook.com/r.php"
browser.get(BASE_URL)
print("Facebook page opened.")

# Perform action using ancestor axes
try:
    # Uncomment line 24 and comment line 26 to run Ancestor axes.
    # action_xpath = '*//input[@name="sex"]/ancestor::div[2]//input[@name="lastname"]'

    action_xpath = '*//div[@id="reg_form_box"]/child::div[11]/button'
    action_element = WebDriverWait(browser, 30).until(
        EC.presence_of_element_located((By.XPATH, action_xpath))
    )
    time.sleep(3)
    action_element.click()
    print("Ancestor axes action is performed and clicked.")
    
    # Pause for 10 seconds
    time.sleep(10)
    
except Exception as e:
    print("Failed to perform action using ancestor axes.")

# Close the browser
browser.quit()

XPath for child axes

Explanation

Lines 10–15: We set up the options of Chrome and install the browser using webdriver.
Lines 17–19: We define the Facebook registration page’s URL and launch the Facebook browser page.
Lines 25: We use the XPath of the *//div[@id=“reg_form_box”] element to pick the div where the id is equal to the reg_form_box. The next statement, /child::div[11]/button, narrows it down to the 11th child of this div. Lastly, we click the button to select the direct child of the 11th div from the reg_form_box .
Lines 26: We use the WebDriverWait and ExpectedConditions to find the presence of the element pointed by the XPath.
Lines 29–30: We use the time.sleep() function to add 3 seconds to see the Selenium automation. We click the button after this.
Lines 36–40: We handle any exceptions and finally, close the browser using the browser.quit() function.

How to use the XPath axes method in Selenium

List of axes

Axes and Their Functionalities

Using XPath axes

The `parent` axe

Output

The `child` axe

Output

The `ancestor` axe

Output

The `preceding` axe

Output

Example

Explanation

How to use the XPath axes method in Selenium

List of axes

Axes and Their Functionalities

Using XPath axes

The parent axe

Output

The child axe

Output

The ancestor axe

Output

The preceding axe

Output

Example

Explanation

The `parent` axe

The `child` axe

The `ancestor` axe

The `preceding` axe