Working with identifiers

The Identifier editor dialog is shown when you either Add a new Identifier or select to edit an existing identifier. This dialog is a powerful tool to define your identifiers.

Identifier

An Identifier is defined by a method and a specification. There are two input elements in front of the Identifier label to enter both these values. By default, the best matching strategy is pre-populated in the Method and Specification input box.

Method:

The Method combo box lists all the allowed methods. Select the appropriate method that you want to use from the list.

Specification

In the Specification text box specify the value based on what method you select. Each method may have different syntax requirements.

The top right corner of the dialog displays an icon showing how good the identifier is. This icon changes dynamically when you change either method or specification.

Available strategies

UseMango provides various strategies for identifying the element. All the strategies are listed under the Available Strategies section. The strategies are listed in the order of their effectiveness. Click on any of the strategy rows to get the strategy details populated as Method and Specification for the identifier.

Each of the strategy rows displays the following details in that order:

  • The name of the strategy.
  • The Method used by the strategy to locate the items.
  • The Specification that shall be used by that strategy.
  • Icon showing how good the strategy is.
Unique Id strategy

To Identify an HTML element this strategy uses the id attribute of that element which must be unique within the HTML document.

Use this strategy when the element you are trying to interact with has an id.

To Identify an HTML element, this strategy uses the element’s visible text. For this strategy to work properly the text given must be an exact match of the text of the element including character casing.

This strategy can only be used to identify Link elements (HTML A tag). Using this strategy with any other type of element will not work.

Partial Id strategy

To Identify an HTML element, this strategy uses the match on part of the id attribute of that element which must be unique within the HTML document.

Use this strategy when the element you are trying to interact with has an id but that id has some variable part like say session id which is bound to change often.

Ancestor Id strategy

This strategy locates the target element by using its nearest ancestor with an id together with a relative path from that ancestor to the target. The identifier is specified as an xpath expression. This strategy is likely to be most stable when the navigation path between the ancestor and the target element is short

Use this strategy when none of the above-mentioned strategies match the target element.

Selected HTML fragment

This section displays the HTML for the target element being located by this identifier. User the + and - buttons on right-hand side to either increase or decrease the scope of the displayed HTML. Increasing the scope allows you to see the parent and sibling elements.