RSelenium can't find element with given parameters - r

Question

I'm using RSelenium to construct a data frame with information about managers. I have problem to select an element in a drop-down list.
My code is the following:
> require(RSelenium)
> remDr<-remoteDriver(browserName = "chrome")
> remDr$open()
> enlace<-'https://www.sisben.gov.co/atencion-al-ciudadano/Paginas/Directorio-administradores.aspx'
> remDr$navigate(enlace)
> remDr$findElement(using = "xpath", '//*[#id="ddlDepartamento"]/option[2]')$clickElement()
With the last line, I obtain the following error:
Selenium message:no such element: Unable to locate element: {"method":"xpath","selector":"//*[#id="ddlMunicipio"]"}
(Session info: chrome=58.0.3029.110)
(Driver info: chromedriver=2.27.440174 (e97a722caafc2d3a8b807ee115bfb307f7d2cfd9),platform=Windows NT 10.0.14393 x86_64) (WARNING: The server did not provide any stacktrace information)
Command duration or timeout: 140 milliseconds
For documentation on this error, please visit: http://seleniumhq.org/exceptions/no_such_element.html
Build info: version: '3.2.0', revision: '8c03df6', time: '2017-03-02 09:34:51 -0800'
System info: host: 'PATY-FRAN', ip: '192.168.0.20', os.name: 'Windows 10', os.arch: 'x86', os.version: '10.0', java.version: '1.8.0_121'
Driver info: org.openqa.selenium.chrome.ChromeDriver
Capabilities [{applicationCacheEnabled=false, rotatable=false, mobileEmulationEnabled=false, networkConnectionEnabled=false, chrome={chromedriverVersion=2.27.440174 (e97a722caafc2d3a8b807ee115bfb307f7d2cfd9), userDataDir=C:\Users\victor\AppData\Local\Temp\scoped_dir6076_6551}, takesHeapSnapshot=true, pageLoadStrategy=normal, databaseEnabled=false, handlesAlerts=true, hasTouchScreen=false, version=58.0.3029.110, platform=XP, browserConnectionEnabled=false, nativeEvents=true, acceptSslCerts=true, locationContextEnabled=true, webStorageEnabled=true, browserName=chrome, takesScreenshot=true, javascriptEnabled=true, cssSelectorsEnabled=true, unexpectedAlertBehaviour=}]
Session ID: 0815f4f9dcca9d364a7c15b4a50352e7
*** Element info: {Using=xpath, value=//*[#id="ddlMunicipio"]}
Error: Summary: NoSuchElement
Detail: An element could not be located on the page using the given search parameters.
class: org.openqa.selenium.NoSuchElementException
Further Details: run errorDetails method
I will be grateful with your help.

Answer 1

The content is in an iframe. You need to switch to the iframe first:
library(RSelenium)
rD<-rsDriver()
remDr <- rD$client
enlace<-'https://www.sisben.gov.co/atencion-al-ciudadano/Paginas/Directorio-administradores.aspx'
remDr$navigate(enlace)
# content is in iframe
frames <- remDr$findElements("css", "iframe")
# switch to first iframe
remDr$switchToFrame(frames[[1]])
selectElem <- remDr$findElement("id", "ddlDepartamento")
selectOpt <- selectElem$selectTag()
> selectOpt$text
[1] "AMAZONAS" "ANTIOQUIA" "ARAUCA" "ATLANTICO"
[5] "BOGOTÁ D.C." "BOLIVAR" "BOYACA" "CALDAS"
[9] "CAQUETA" "CASANARE" "CAUCA" "CESAR"
[13] "CHOCO" "CORDOBA" "CUNDINAMARCA" "GUAINIA"
[17] "GUAJIRA" "GUAVIARE" "HUILA" "MAGDALENA"
[21] "META" "NARIÑO" "NORTE DE SANTANDER" "PUTUMAYO"
[25] "QUINDIO" "RISARALDA" "SAN ANDRES" "SANTANDER"
[29] "SUCRE" "TOLIMA" "VALLE" "VAUPES"
[33] "VICHADA"
# click 2nd one
selectOpt$elements[[2]]$clickElement()
....
....
rm(rD)
gc()