# Select\_list WATIR codes **URL:** \ **Category:** Ruby\ **Created:** [November 9, 2006, 1:12pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/select-list-watir-codes/75366 "2006-11-09T13:12:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![curious](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/c/6bbea6/32.png) [@curious](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/curious)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2006, 1:12pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/select-list-watir-codes/75366/1 "2006-11-09T13:12:25Z")
I have something funny going on with my WATIR. code. in the code below, test.txt file has about 50 lines… for example, line number 1 is ‘test1’, number 2 is ‘test2’, and so on… I am trying to choose this line value in the select box in the web page one by one from the local text file and process it. in the below code, the line… ie.select\_list( :name , “leftsegments”).select(“#{$Guide}”) is supposed to choose test1 from the select box, which is the first line in the test.txt file. Now even though test1 is one of the values in the select box, the message says 'there is no ‘text1’ in the select list. so I tried the code below again with ie.select\_list( :name , “leftsegments”).select(“test1”) and it works fine… what am I doing wrong?? the select box in the web page has more than 150 values… maybe too many values to choose from?? is that confusing the WATIR code?? but what about the error message that says ‘there is no test1 in the select list’??? could anyone help and tell me what I am doing wrong?? thanks. ======================================================================== require ‘watir’ ie = Watir::IE.start(“[http://www.testing.com](http://www.testing.com)”) ie.link(:text, “New Page”).click file = File.open(“c:/test.txt”, “r”) lines = file.readlines() 0.upto(lines.length - 1) {|j| $Guide = lines[j] ie.button(:name, “choose\_segments”).click ie.select\_list( :name , “leftsegments”).select(“#{$Guide}”) ie.button(:name, “leftsegmentsButton”).click } file.close() lines.clear() ---
**Author:** ![curious](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/c/6bbea6/32.png) [@curious](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/curious)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2006, 1:16pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/select-list-watir-codes/75366/2 "2006-11-09T13:16:26Z")
one more comment… above is the select HTML on the web page… does multiple size being 8 would have anything to do with the problem I am having?? So I changed the first line in the text file to the first one in the select list… but still the same situation… any help will be deeply appreciated… thanks. ---
**Author:** ![curious](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/c/6bbea6/32.png) [@curious](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/curious)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2006, 1:30pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/select-list-watir-codes/75366/3 "2006-11-09T13:30:30Z")
I did some addtional testing, and i think the problem has something to do with the format of the line read by the code… I tried other select boxes that surely worked fine… but once i read the choices in the select box from the local text file, then the same problem persists. could anyone please tell me how I should adjust the format of each line read from the local text file so that the WATIR code select each option one by one from the text file?? thanks. ---
**Author:** ![curious](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/c/6bbea6/32.png) [@curious](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/curious)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2006, 4:31pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/select-list-watir-codes/75366/4 "2006-11-09T16:31:11Z")
curious wrote: > > could anyone help and tell me what I am doing wrong?? > > ie.select\_list( :name , “leftsegments”).select({$Guide}") I suspect the trailing newline character; “\n”, is what’s eating your lunch on this. Here’s what I cobbled-up and it works just fine… file = File.open(“test.txt”, “r+”) lines = file.readlines() lines.each {|testName| ie.select\_list(:name, “leftsegments”).select(testName.chop!) #– notice use of .chop! sleep(0.25) } file.close() lines.clear() ---
**Author:** ![curious](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/c/6bbea6/32.png) [@curious](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/curious)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2006, 4:25pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/select-list-watir-codes/75366/5 "2006-11-09T16:25:10Z")
curious wrote: > > could anyone help and tell me what I am doing wrong?? > > ie.select\_list( :name , “leftsegments”).select({$Guide}") I suspect the trailing newline character; “\n”, is what’s eating your lunch on this. Here’s what I cobbled-up and it works just fine… file = File.open(“test.txt”, “r+”) lines = file.readlines() lines.each {|testName| ie.select\_list(:name, “leftsegments”).select(testName.chop!) #– notice use of .chop! sleep(0.25) } file.close() lines.clear() ---
**Author:** ![curious](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/c/6bbea6/32.png) [@curious](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/curious)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2006, 6:51pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/select-list-watir-codes/75366/6 "2006-11-09T18:51:47Z")
chomp: [http://www.rubycentral.com/book/ref\_c\_string.html#String.chomp](http://www.rubycentral.com/book/ref_c_string.html#String.chomp)