Handle Simple Alert

How it works

A JavaScript alert() is a browser dialog, not part of the page, so findElement() cannot reach it. You switch to it with driver.switchTo().alert(), which returns an Alert. getText() reads its message and accept() presses OK.

While an alert is open, the page is blocked. Any other command, even getTitle(), throws UnhandledAlertException with the alert's text in the message, and Selenium's default behaviour then dismisses the alert, so a following switchTo().alert() finds nothing.

Switching when no alert is open throws NoAlertPresentException: no such alert. The same happens if you call getText() on an Alert you already accepted, which is why the text must be read before accept().

About the assignment

The Alerts page has a button that opens a simple alert. The buttons have no ids, so you locate this one by its text. You open the alert, read its message, close it, and print the message.

What you will do

1. 1Find the button by its exact label with an XPath text match and click it.
2. 2Switch to the alert and store its message in a String.
3. 3Call accept() to close it.
4. 4Print the stored message after the label Alert text:.

Common mistakes

• Reading the text after accept()

  The alert is gone, so getText() throws NoAlertPresentException. Read first, then accept.

• Touching the page before closing the alert

  Any page command throws UnhandledAlertException and the alert is dismissed for you, which can hide the step that went wrong.

• Trying to handle the modal like an alert

  The page's "Open Modal" button shows an HTML modal, not a browser dialog. switchTo().alert() throws NoAlertPresentException; locate the modal's buttons with normal locators instead.

In a real test suite

Related lessons

• Handle Confirm AlertConfirm dialogs, where OK and Cancel lead to different results.
• XPath - BasicsLocate a button by its text with XPath, since these buttons have no ids.
• Switch to Frame by IDAnother switchTo() target: frames inside the page.

To try one of these calls on any page without a task, open the Online Selenium Java Compiler.

Starter code

The editor above opens with this code. Fill in the TODO lines, then run and submit it.

import org.openqa.selenium.*;
import org.openqa.selenium.chrome.ChromeDriver;

public class Main {
    public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception {
        WebDriver driver = new ChromeDriver();
        driver.get("https://testkru.com/Interactions/Alerts");
        
        // TODO: Click "Show Alert" button
        // TODO: Switch to alert and get text
        // TODO: Accept the alert
        // TODO: Print alert text
        
        driver.quit();
    }
}