How to click on a hidden button with selenium through Python - python-3.x

Question

I’m trying to click an Upload from my Computer button on a page that has the source below.
I’m using selenium and tried several different approaches. The past failed approaches are commented out below, along with the current failed approach. The error that’s returned with the current approach is below.
Can anyone see what the issue might be and suggest how to solve it? I’m new to selenium so if someone can provide some explanation of what the html is doing and how their code solves the issue as well it would be really helpful for my understanding.
HTML code of the button:
<div class="hidden-xs">
<label for="fuUploadFromMyComputer" class="hidden">
Upload from my Computer
</label>
<input id="fuUploadFromMyComputer" type="file" name="upload">
<button id="btnUploadFromMyComputer"
class="center-block btn btn-white-fill btn-block "
data-resume-type="COMPUTER" type="submit">
<i class="zmdi zmdi-desktop-mac"></i>
Upload from my Computer
</button>
</div>
attempts:
# clicking upload button
# upload_btn = driver.find_element_by_id("fuUploadFromMyComputer")
# upload_btn = driver.find_element_by_css_selector(
# '.center-block.btn.btn-white-fill.btn-block')
# upload_btn = driver.find_element_by_link_text('Upload from my Computer')
# upload_btn.click()
from selenium.webdriver.support.ui import WebDriverWait
from selenium.webdriver.common.by import By
from selenium.webdriver.support import expected_conditions as EC
WebDriverWait(driver, 20).until(EC.element_to_be_clickable(
(By.CSS_SELECTOR, "div.center-block btn.btn-white-fill.btn-block"))).click()
error:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
TimeoutException Traceback (most recent call last)
<ipython-input-43-8fd80ff3c690> in <module>()
14 from selenium.webdriver.support import expected_conditions as EC
15
---> 16 WebDriverWait(driver, 20).until(EC.element_to_be_clickable((By.CSS_SELECTOR, "div.center-block btn.btn-white-fill.btn-block"))).click()
17
18 time.sleep(3)
~/anaconda/envs/py36/lib/python3.6/site-packages/selenium/webdriver/support/wait.py in until(self, method, message)
78 if time.time() > end_time:
79 break
---> 80 raise TimeoutException(message, screen, stacktrace)
81
82 def until_not(self, method, message=''):
TimeoutException: Message:

Answer 1

To click on the element with text as Upload from my Computer you need to induce WebDriverwait for the element to be clickable and you can use either of the following solutions:
CSS_SELECTOR:
WebDriverWait(driver, 20).until(EC.element_to_be_clickable((By.CSS_SELECTOR, "button.center-block.btn.btn-white-fill.btn-block#btnUploadFromMyComputer"))).click()
XPATH:
WebDriverWait(driver, 20).until(EC.element_to_be_clickable((By.XPATH, "//button[#class='center-block btn btn-white-fill btn-block ' and #id='btnUploadFromMyComputer']"))).click()
Note: You have to add the following imports :
from selenium.webdriver.support.ui import WebDriverWait
from selenium.webdriver.common.by import By
from selenium.webdriver.support import expected_conditions as EC

Answer 2

Selenium's click() does not support to operate on invisible element. Thus please double confirm the button is visible or not when your code intend to click it.
If the button is not visible, how do you click it hands-on? Thus change your script to following the human steps to make the button visible before you can click it.
Back to your failure on below code
WebDriverWait(driver, 20).until(EC.element_to_be_clickable(
(By.CSS_SELECTOR, "div.center-block btn.btn-white-fill.btn-block"))).click()
The reason is you give a wrong css selector which can't find any element from the page util reach the waiting timeout.
The correct css selector of the button can be any one of following:
button.center-block.btn.btn-white-fill.btn-block
button#btnUploadFromMyComputer

Answer 3

For C#, I used IJavaScriptExecutor to click on element. You may search this solution for Python syntax
public static void scrollElementToClick(IWebDriver driver, IWebElement element)
{
IJavaScriptExecutor ex = (IJavaScriptExecutor)driver;
ex.ExecuteScript("arguments[0].click();", element);
}