Web Automation with Selenium
Automate browser tasks, form filling, and UI testing with Selenium.
Why Selenium?
Selenium allows you to automate a real browser (Chrome, Firefox). It's essential for sites that require login, interactions, or heavy JavaScript execution.
Setup
$ pip install selenium webdriver-manager
Basic Browser Control
from selenium import webdriver
from selenium.webdriver.chrome.service import Service
from webdriver_manager.chrome import ChromeDriverManager
driver = webdriver.Chrome(service=Service(ChromeDriverManager().install()))
driver.get("https://google.com")
print(driver.title)
driver.quit()
from selenium.webdriver.chrome.service import Service
from webdriver_manager.chrome import ChromeDriverManager
driver = webdriver.Chrome(service=Service(ChromeDriverManager().install()))
driver.get("https://google.com")
print(driver.title)
driver.quit()
Interacting with Elements
from selenium.webdriver.common.by import By
# Finding by name
search_box = driver.find_element(By.NAME, "q")
# Typing and Clicking
search_box.send_keys("Python Examples")
search_box.submit()
# Finding by name
search_box = driver.find_element(By.NAME, "q")
# Typing and Clicking
search_box.send_keys("Python Examples")
search_box.submit()
Waiting for Elements
Modern sites are dynamic. Always use explicit waits to avoid flaky scripts.
from selenium.webdriver.support.ui import WebDriverWait
from selenium.webdriver.support import expected_conditions as EC
wait = WebDriverWait(driver, 10)
elem = wait.until(EC.element_to_be_clickable((By.ID, "login-btn")))
from selenium.webdriver.support import expected_conditions as EC
wait = WebDriverWait(driver, 10)
elem = wait.until(EC.element_to_be_clickable((By.ID, "login-btn")))
✅ Practice (30 minutes)
- Write a script that opens a login page, fills in credentials, and submits.
- Capture a screenshot of the results page (
driver.save_screenshot). - Automate a search on a site and print the titles of the results.
- Run the browser in headless mode (no GUI).