Selenium with Python

Debugging

Use something like http://www.pyzo.org/pyzo_intro.html

Documentation

http://selenium-python.readthedocs.io/api.html?highlight=phantom#module-selenium.webdriver.remote.webdriver

Find Selenium Version

$> python

>>> import selenium >>> help (selenium) (...) DATA __version__ = '3.8.0' VERSION 3.8.0


Also you can check a pip package version with:

$ pip show selenium

Installation

1. Note down your Firefox version (in my case 52.5.1 ESR)
   Maybe install an Extended Support Release (ESR) type and disable updates to make sure you get a  constant development environment. Note that you will be more exposed to security flaws by not updating.
2. Get Python. In my case I used Python 2.7.8.
   Install it with python version manager:
   https://github.com/pyenv/pyenv
   Follow instructions from the link above, namely :

   $ git clone https://github.com/pyenv/pyenv.git ~/.pyenv
   $ echo 'export PYENV_ROOT="$HOME/.pyenv"' >> ~/.bash_profile
   $ echo 'export PATH="$PYENV_ROOT/bin:$PATH"' >> ~/.bash_profile
   $ echo -e 'if command -v pyenv 1>/dev/null 2>&1; then\n  eval "$(pyenv init -)"\nfi' >> ~/.bash_profile
   $ reboot
   
   # after reboot
   
   $ pyenv install 2.7.8

3. Get Selenium for Python. In my case I used Selenium 3.8.0

   pip install selenium==3.8.0

4. Get PhantomJS binary and put it on path
   https://bitbucket.org/ariya/phantomjs/downloads/

5. Get Firefox geckowebdriver and put it on path.
   https://github.com/mozilla/geckodriver/releases

Make sure you use a web driver version compatible with your selenium version.

To find selenium version see previous section.

Troubleshooting

Problem: WebDriverException: Message: 'geckodriver' executable needs to be in PATH.
or
selenium.common.exceptions.WebDriverException: Message: 'geckodriver' executable needs to be in PATH.

Solution

https://github.com/mozilla/geckodriver/releases
Put geckodriver.exe in your PATH or in the current directory.

Problem : Firefox displays : Your connection is not secure

Solution : Help needed! I still don't know how to resolve. Even with a loaded profile. This happens on Windows, but not on Linux.

Problem: selenium.common.exceptions.WebDriverException: Message: 'phantomjs' executable needs to be in PATH.