see if the div is present or not in geb

Question

We are using Geb for automation. I have spinner loaded before every page gets loaded. we are using waitFor() , but it takes a long time and the scripts are getting run more than the specified time.The DOM element is

   <div classname="loader"></div>

i tried to see if the element is present.

   if(!$(".loader").displayed== true)
   {}

But i am getting error as ,

   geb.waiting.WaitTimeoutException: condition did not pass in 40.0 seconds (failed with exception)

at geb.waiting.Wait.waitFor(Wait.groovy:138)
at geb.waiting.DefaultWaitingSupport.doWaitFor(DefaultWaitingSupport.groovy:51)
at geb.waiting.DefaultWaitingSupport.waitFor(DefaultWaitingSupport.groovy:46)
at geb.Page.waitFor(Page.groovy:516)
at geb.Browser.methodMissing(Browser.groovy:206)
at geb.spock.GebSpec.methodMissing(GebSpec.groovy:56)
at loaderSpec(loaderSpec.groovy:415)
 Caused by: Assertion failed: 

 $(".loader").displayed== false
|            |        |
  |            true     false
   [[[ChromeDriver: chrome on XP (1b3943691dd96ebaf9098b1720c87ee9)] -> css 
 selector: .loader]]

at loaderSpec(loaderSpec.groovy:415)
at loaderSpec(loaderSpec.groovy:415)
at geb.waiting.Wait.waitFor(Wait.groovy:127)
... 6 more

I am not sure how to check if the div is present or not present. If I extend the time to wait for, I am getting element not found error.

Kindly let me know your input.

Answer 1

Are you checking that the div is visible while you are waiting for the spinner to go away? I've had an issue exactly like this that plagued me. Here is the solution my coworkers and I came up with:

try{
    waitFor(10) { element.isDisplayed() } //wait for spinner to kick in
    waitFor() { !element.isDisplayed() }  //wait for spinner to go away
} catch(WaitTimeoutException e) { 
// if spinner loads & deloads faster than this code is reached
// then WTE will be caught and we dont need to handle the spinner any more

    //println(e.printStackTrace())
}