[🚀 Feature]: deprecate WebElement.getAttribute

[joerg1985]

Feature and motivation

WebElement.getDomAttribute and WebElement.getDomProperty have been added in Selenium 4.

It might be good to deprecate WebElement.getAttribute to remove it at a undefined time in the future.

Usage example

This would warn people to move to the 'new' methods when maintaining existing code.

[github-actions]

@joerg1985, thank you for creating this issue. We will troubleshoot it as soon as we can.

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Thank you!

[titusfortner]

Bold.

I'm not completely against the idea, but also not sure it's the right call.

[NCLnclNCL]

Feature and motivation

WebElement.getDomAttribute and WebElement.getDomProperty have been added in Selenium 4.

It might be good to deprecate WebElement.getAttribute to remove it at a undefined time in the future.

Usage example

This would warn people to move to the 'new' methods when maintaining existing code.

Let me ask, are the 3 APIs above different?

[titusfortner]

getAttribute() assumes that people don't know the difference between a property and an attribute and don't want to be bothered to figure it out (a decent assumption), so it uses a bunch of fancy JavaScript that does a pretty good job of guessing whether the user is looking for the property or the attribute and returning that value. It's great convenience, but it is now implemented with a client side atom which means a large payload gets sent to the driver/server on every usage.

The ideal world people figure out if they want an attribute or property and use the correct method. But that might be asking a lot of users, and we already have the code right there...

[joerg1985]

I was reading the blog post and the javadoc before opening the issue, this gave me the feeling the getAttribute method is the legacy way of reading attributes/properties.

If this is not true and there are no plans to ever remove the getAttribute method, this issue can be closed.

If this is a legacy method, it might be good to mark it deprecated or make a clear statement in the docs to ensure no new code is using this.
I agree there is alot of code using this, therefore a deprecation notice could be added, something like:
don't panic, this method will not be removed before selenium 6, but should not be used in new code.

[titusfortner]

It would definitely be valuable to encourage people to use the other methods.

[titusfortner]

We decided in TLC Meeting 1/18 that we would go ahead and mark this feature deprecated to encourage people to move to the more precise property and attribute methods.

We need a blog post explaining everything though, and I'm still not sure we want to actually remove it any time soon because it is quite useful.

[github-actions]

This issue is stale because it has been open 280 days with no activity. Remove stale label or comment or this will be closed in 14 days.

[Delta456]

We decided in TLC Meeting 1/18 that we would go ahead and mark this feature deprecated to encourage people to move to the more precise property and attribute methods.

We need a blog post explaining everything though, and I'm still not sure we want to actually remove it any time soon because it is quite useful.

Are we still doing this?

[joerg1985]

I hope so, i think this is still a valid point.

[Delta456]

I can make a PR to deprecate WebElement.getAttribute and also help with the blog post if required.

[diemol]

It is still valid, just that no one has worked on it. Thank you for offering, @Delta456!

[Delta456]

I will PR the deprecation but for the blog I will need your help @diemol and others.

[joerg1985]

I just noticed something strage, which is probably the root for having getAttribute.
When an element is modified via javascript, e.g. call e.multiple=true on a <select>.
The getDomProperty changes, but getDomAttribute will stay null.
So client code should allways first check getDomProperty and then getDomAttribute.

This is a important point to the blog post in my mind.

[Delta456]

Across all language bindings the method has been deprecated. We now need to work on a blog post. I am up to volunteer for this.

[diemol]

If we are now going to ask users to do this #13334 (comment), then I think I am changing my mind, even if it was a TLC decision. We should be helping users and not asking them to do more. I am not sure what the real benefit of getting rid of this method is.

[canon-cmre-benoit-lecardonnel]

Is there a blog post explaining how to migrate from getAttribute? We're now getting deprecation warnings, but I'm not sure what the difference between an attribute and a property is.
The Javadoc points to e.g. https://w3c.github.io/webdriver/#get-element-attribute, but that does not list usual property and attribute names.
Does #13334 (comment) mean that we should now call both and choose the first one that does not return null?

[joerg1985]

@canon-cmre-benoit-lecardonnel There is no new blog post regarding the deprecation yet, but there is still the Selenium 4 - Element Attribute and Property Methods available.

[canon-cmre-benoit-lecardonnel]

there is still the Selenium 4 - Element Attribute and Property Methods available.

Thanks @joerg1985 - This is a very useful page.
Ideally, the javadoc of getAttribute would point to a similar article once it's available.

[abdulrhmanAlfiky]

dears,
can anyone help me explain the differences between getDomProperty() and getDomAttribute(), as examples in @joerg1985 comment is not explained enough

[sivasankari2902]

dears, can anyone help me explain the differences between getDomProperty() and getDomAttribute(), as examples in @joerg1985 comment is not explained enough

The difference I noticed is getDomAttribute()- Returns the attribute value exactly as written in HTML.
getDomProperty()-Returns Current/RunTime attribute value.

e.g:getDomAttribute

WebElement input = driver.findElement(By.id("username"));
String value = input.getDomAttribute("value"); // Returns "testUser"
system.out.println(input.getDomProperty("value")); //Returns "testUser"

Key Point: Reflects the current state of the element, including any changes made during execution.(In html whatever we make change in runtime that wont reflect it will display the same value only)

getDomProperty:

WebElement input = driver.findElement(By.id("username"));
input.clear();
input.sendKeys("newInput"); // Changes value in the browser
String value = input.getDomProperty("value"); // Returns "newInput"
system.out.println(input.getDomAttribute("value")); //Still Returns old value "testUser"

getDomAttribute(): Static, from the HTML source.
getDomProperty(): Dynamic, reflects real-time state.