selenium clear() command doesn't clear the element

Question

I have been writing selenium scripts for a while in Java. I encountered a very weird issue today.

Here is the issue: I cleared a text field using webelement.clear()

Answer 1

I solved it by adding a function to my BasePage to clear fields by a given WebElement.

 public void clearWebField(WebElement element){
    while(!element.getAttribute("value").equals("")){
        element.sendKeys(Keys.BACK_SPACE);
    }
}

You can also implement this method in the page that experiencing the problem.

Answer 2

I had a similar issue with a text field that used an auto-complete plugin. I had to explicitly clear the attribute value as well as do a SendKeys. I created an extension method to encapsulate the behaviour, hopefully the snippet below will help:

public static void SendKeysAutocomplete(this IWebElement element, string fieldValue)
{
   element.SendKeys(fieldValue);
   element.SetAttribute("value", fieldValue);
}

public static void SetAttribute(this IWebElement element, string attributeName, string attributeValue)
{
   var driver = WebDriverHelper.GetDriverFromScenarioContext();

   var executor = (IJavaScriptExecutor)driver;
   executor.ExecuteScript("arguments[0].setAttribute(arguments[1], arguments[2]);", element, attributeName, attributeValue);
}

Answer 3

Faced a similar problem. The input field is cleared but the error message is not updated. It seems that some input fields work correctly only if you enter and delete a character:

element.sendKeys(text);
element.sendKeys(Keys.SPACE, Keys.BACK_SPACE);

Answer 4

I am using Mac and the following code helps also

  public static void macCleanHack(WebElement element) {
        String inputText = element.getAttribute("value");
        if( inputText != null ) {
            for(int i=0; i<inputText.length();i++) {
                element.sendKeys(Keys.BACK_SPACE);
            }
        }

    }

Answer 5

I don't know the exact reason for your element keeping its value, but you can try an alternative text clearance by sending 'Ctrl+A+Delete' key combination using sendKeys method of the element's object:

emailAddress.sendKeys(Keys.chord(Keys.CONTROL,"a", Keys.DELETE));

Answer 6

Hope this helps to clear the field and then sendKeys() the needed value

 while (!inputField.getAttribute("value").equals("")) {
        inputField.sendKeys(Keys.BACK_SPACE);
       }
        inputField.sendKeys("your_value");