Get attribute value in Capybara

Question

I have an HTML partial that looks like this:

<input id="order_date" name="order_date" class="date-applied"
 onchange="restoreDate=false;" type="text" value="01/05/2016" 
 size="12" maxlength="10"/>

I need to retrieve the value of attribute value using Capybara. I have tried using this code, without success:

find(:xpath,"//table[2']/tbody/tr[7]/td[@name='order_date]")['value']

How do I make this work?

Answer 1

You might check that your xpath returns a value. The xpath that you used as an example has multiple syntax errors. Try this, instead:

find(:xpath, "//table[2]/tbody/tr[7]/td/input[@name="order_date"]")['value']

I created a structurally correct test document based on what it appears you're searching for. The xpath above found the input element in this document:

<document>
    <table></table>
    <table>
        <tbody>
            <tr></tr>
            <tr></tr>
            <tr></tr>
            <tr></tr>
            <tr></tr>
            <tr></tr>
            <tr>
                <td>
                    <input id="order_date" name="order_date" class="date-applied"
                     onchange="restoreDate=false;" type="text" value="01/05/2016" 
                     size="12" maxlength="10"/>
                </td>
            </tr>
        </tbody>
    </table>
</document>