How to explicitly specify a path to Firefox for Selenium?

Question

I got Selenium IDE, followed this post, got to

python test_default_server.py

and it complains Firefox is not in my path:

Please add the directory containing ''firefox.exe'' to your PATH environment
variable, or explicitly specify a path to Firefox 3 like this:
*firefox3c:\blah\firefox.exe

I could change my PATH environment variable, but I'd rather pursue the local config option they are mentioning ("explicitly specify a path"). How do I do that? What does the "*firefox3c" refer to?

Selenium 1.0.1, Python 2.5, Windows XP.

I assume there is a missing character in there, and it should be something like: firefox3=c:\blah\firefox.exe — Craig McQueen, Aug 28 '09 at 01:30

score 16 · Answer 1 · edited Mar 02 '11 at 16:04

16

You have to use the following string when you instantiate selenium instead of just "*firefox":

"*firefox C:\\Program Files\\Mozilla Firefox\\firefox.exe"

Notice: I'm not sure that path is correct, but it should be a similar one.

Update: Where do you instantiate your browser? By the tags in the question I suppose you're a python guy:

def setUp(self):
    self.verificationErrors = []
    self.selenium = selenium("localhost", 4444, "*firefox C:\\Program Files\\Mozilla Firefox\\firefox.exe", "http://change-this-to-the-site-you-are-testing/")
    self.selenium.start()

edited Mar 02 '11 at 16:04

slartidan

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answered Aug 28 '09 at 05:00

Santi

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where do you instantiate selenium? You mean at the command line? Is it a command-line arg? – dfrankow Aug 29 '09 at 17:13
1

Notice that you'll neet to add r as a prefix to "*firefox..." as it - r"*firefox C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe". This fixed the problem for me. – Jonathan Livni Jun 26 '10 at 16:45
One reason this doesn't work is that Python uses \ to escape characters. You need to make it /, or \\. – boatcoder Dec 14 '10 at 16:27
The path "*firefox C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe" should be updated with correct answer to avoid unnecessary bug finding, either r"*firefox C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe" or "*firefox C:/Program Files/Mozilla Firefox/firefox.exe" – OnesimusUnbound Feb 22 '11 at 00:35
Apparently this issue has resurfaced for Windows 7 64-bit in the most recent 2.0 beta: http://jira.openqa.org/browse/SEL-737 – Noyo Feb 22 '11 at 20:02
I apologize I have not tested the solution because I do not have the environment to test it anymore, I'd have to recreate it. – dfrankow Apr 04 '11 at 21:29

score 2 · Answer 2 · edited Mar 07 '14 at 21:48

2

If on C# editor, use the following string:

selenium = new DefaultSelenium("localhost", 4444, "*firefox C:\\Program Files\\firefox.exe", "http://www.google.com/");

Note: use an extra back slash before Program Files and firefox.exe, since a single backslash becomes an unrecognized escape sequence.

edited Mar 07 '14 at 21:48

alecxe

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answered Nov 02 '10 at 23:28

Pallavi

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Mir Kazim Ali Tabrez · Answer 3 · 2015-02-05T09:18:42.507

For Java Solution using Selenium Webdriver, you can import the below class:

import org.openqa.selenium.firefox.FirefoxBinary;

and use the code snippet below to instantiate a new driver by explicitly specifying the path to the firefox.exe in your local system.

DesiredCapabilities browserCapabilities = DesiredCapabilities.firefox();
FirefoxBinary ffbinary = new FirefoxBinary(new File("C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe"));
FirefoxProfile ffprofile = new FirefoxProfile();
WebDriver driver = new FirefoxDriver(ffbinary, ffprofile, browserCapabilities);

Note: You may need to replace "C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe" with the path that points to firefox.exe on your local machine.

score 1 · Answer 4 · edited Mar 07 '14 at 21:47

1

selenium("localhost", 4444, "*firefox C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe", "http://change-this-to-the-site-you-are-testing/")

Worked in Java.

edited Mar 07 '14 at 21:47

alecxe

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answered Jan 26 '11 at 15:32

Mathura

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score 1 · Answer 5 · edited May 26 '12 at 11:31

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This helps very much. setUp("http://localhost:8080/BingDemo/BingDriver.html", "*firefox C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe");

However, replace all occurrences of \ with \\ in *firefox C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe

Additionally, you could point your PATH to in environmental variables to mozilla.exe

edited May 26 '12 at 11:31

Martijn Pieters

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answered Apr 04 '11 at 14:27

Leon

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score 0 · Answer 6 · edited May 23 '17 at 10:29

0

The *firefox etc are the keys for which browser to use to run the tests.

There is a long list of them at How to run Google Chrome with Selenium RC? - so you can target Firefox v2 (*firefox2), Firefox v3 (*firefox3), Google Chrome (*googlechrome) etc

edited May 23 '17 at 10:29

Community

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answered Aug 28 '09 at 12:10

Jane

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in the initialisation, i.e. selenium = new DefaultSelenium("localhost", 4444, "*chrome", "http://stackoverflow.com"); Replace the "*chrome" bit with any of those keys to target a different browser – Jane Sep 03 '09 at 12:13

score 0 · Answer 7 · edited Jan 27 '15 at 19:19

0

I found it worth useful...

Selenium selenium = new DefaultSelenium("localhost", 4444, "*firefox C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe", "http://gmail.com");

edited Jan 27 '15 at 19:19

Lorenz Meyer

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answered Jan 27 '15 at 19:03

user4500070

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score 0 · Answer 8 · edited Nov 25 '12 at 14:55

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This helps very much.

setUp("http://localhost:8080/BingDemo/BingDriver.html", "*firefox C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Mozilla Firefox\\firefox.exe");

edited Nov 25 '12 at 14:55

j0k

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answered Apr 04 '11 at 14:21

Leon

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How to explicitly specify a path to Firefox for Selenium?

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