launch selenium from python on ubuntu

Question

I have the following script

from selenium import webdriver

browser = webdriver.Firefox()
browser.get('http://localhost:8000')

assert 'Django' in browser.title

I get the following error

$ python3 functional_tests.py 
Traceback (most recent call last):   File "functional_tests.py", line 3, in <module>
    browser = webdriver.Firefox()   File "/usr/local/lib/python3.5/dist-packages/selenium/webdriver/firefox/webdriver.py", line 80, in __init__
    self.binary, timeout)   File "/usr/local/lib/python3.5/dist-packages/selenium/webdriver/firefox/extension_connection.py", line 52, in __init__
    self.binary.launch_browser(self.profile, timeout=timeout)   File "/usr/local/lib/python3.5/dist-packages/selenium/webdriver/firefox/firefox_binary.py", line 68, in launch_browser
    self._wait_until_connectable(timeout=timeout)   File "/usr/local/lib/python3.5/dist-packages/selenium/webdriver/firefox/firefox_binary.py", line 99, in _wait_until_connectable
    "The browser appears to have exited " selenium.common.exceptions.WebDriverException: Message: The browser appears to have exited before we could connect. If you specified a log_file in the FirefoxBinary constructor, check it for details.

pip3 list shows selenium (2.53.6).

firefox -v shows Mozilla Firefox 47.0.

Sound slike a compatibility problem: what firefox and selenium versions have you installed? — alecxe
– alecxe, Commented Sep 13, 2016 at 20:03
The last version of Firefox is not working properly with selenium. Try with 46 or 45. You can download here ftp.mozilla.org/pub/firefox/releases — Tales Pádua
– Tales Pádua, Commented Sep 13, 2016 at 20:23
that did it. sudo apt-get install firefox=45.0.2+build1-0ubuntu1 to downgrade. @TalesPádua if you write it up as an answer I'd be happy to make it the right answer. — Harry Moreno
– Harry Moreno, Commented Sep 13, 2016 at 21:25

B B · Accepted Answer · 2016-09-16 16:21:41Z

4

I struggled with this problem as well, and I was unhappy with having to use older versions of Firefox. Here's my solution that uses the latest version of Firefox. It however involves several steps

Step 1. Download v0.9.0 Marionette, the next generation of FirefoxDriver, from this location: https://github.com/mozilla/geckodriver/releases/download/v0.9.0/geckodriver-v0.9.0-linux64.tar.gz

Step 2. Extract the file to a desired folder, and rename it to "wires". In my case I created a folder named "add_to_system_path" under Documents. So the file is in Documents/add_to_system_path/wires (also make sure that the wires file is executable under its properties)

Step 3. Create a file named ".pam_environment" under your home folder, and then adding this line on it and save

PATH DEFAULT=${PATH}:/absolute/path/to/the/folder/where/wires/is/saved

What this does is it tells ubuntu to add the enumerated dir in .pam_environment to your system path

Step 4. Save the file, log out of your user session, and log back in. This is necessary to do so that the files in the newly added system path is recognized by ubuntu

Step 5. Use the code below to instantiate the browser instance:

`
from selenium import webdriver
from selenium.webdriver.common.desired_capabilities import DesiredCapabilities

capabilities = DesiredCapabilities.FIREFOX
capabilities["marionette"] = True
browser = webdriver.Firefox(capabilities=capabilities)
browser.get('http://your-target-url')`

Firefox should now be able to instantiate as usual.

answered Sep 16, 2016 at 16:21

B B

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2 Comments

B B Over a year ago

You're welcome. Hopefully some people find this solution helpful.

Corey Goldberg Over a year ago

this answer is outdated with the release of selenium 3.x.

Harry Moreno · Accepted Answer · 2016-10-20 21:20:30Z

0

The last version of Firefox is not working properly with selenium. Try with 46 or 45.

You can download here: ftp.mozilla.org/pub/firefox/releases

or sudo apt-get install firefox=45.0.2+build1-0ubuntu1

You can also do this graphically as shown here http://www.howtogeek.com/117929/how-to-downgrade-packages-on-ubuntu/

edited Oct 20, 2016 at 21:20

Harry Moreno

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answered Sep 13, 2016 at 22:08

Tales Pádua

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