Develop Reference

How to debug timed out waiting for asynchronous Angular tasks? Failure to find elements on angular page occurring

Edit: Note that I found the root of my problem after help from #ernst-zwingli, so if you have this same error one of his noted fixes might help you out. My problem is a known issue with Protractor itself, if you think this may be you, I've expanded on my steps to pinpoint the root of the problem after my original question.
I'm trying to use Protractor in an Angular2 (just Angular) application built using angular-cli.
My problem: Elements on an Angular app page are not being found when browser.waitForAngularEnabledis at it's default setting of true (as in 'I believe I am on an angular page and would like for Protractor to do it's magic'). They are being found just fine if I set browser.waitForAngularEnabledto false (as in 'I am not on an angular page and would like to handle this myself, take a seat Protractor'). How do I track down what's causing this on my definitely Angular pages?
I have a product with a non-Angular Auth0 login page that gates access to the rest of the product that is written in Angular (Angular 4.3.2 to be exact). I have successfully traversed logging in on the non-Angular login page. I flipped the waitForAngularEnabled switched to false to facilitate the non-Angular login. I turned it back to true at the point where I expected my initial landing page (Angular) to be loaded, after clicking the submit button. Code is as follows:
browser.waitForAngularEnabled(false);
browser.driver.get('https://dashboard.net/projects');
browser.driver.sleep(10000);
browser.driver.findElement(By.css("[type='email']"));
browser.driver.findElement(By.css("[type='email']")).sendKeys("email#example.com");
browser.driver.findElement(By.css(".auth0-label-submit")).click();
browser.driver.findElement(By.id("passwordInput")).sendKeys("password");
browser.driver.findElement(By.id("submitButton")).click();
browser.driver.sleep(5000); // needed if not waiting for Angular
//browser.waitForAngularEnabled(true); // Back to Protractor land we go
let elementToFind = element(by.className("header-text"));
elementToFind.isDisplayed().then(function() {grabTheDarnLocalStorage()});
expect(elementToFind.isDisplayed()).toBeTruthy();
If I uncomment the browser.waitForAngularEnabled(true); line to state that I'm back in Angular code I get the error trace as follows:
Failed: Timed out waiting for asynchronous Angular tasks to finish after 30 seconds. This may be because the current page is not an Angular application. Please see the FAQ for more details: https://github.com/angular/protractor/blob/master/docs/timeouts.md#waiting-for-angular
While waiting for element with locator - Locator: By(css selector, .header-text)
ScriptTimeoutError: asynchronous script timeout: result was not received in 30 seconds
(Session info: chrome=61.0.3163.100)
(Driver info: chromedriver=2.32.498550 (9dec58e66c31bcc53a9ce3c7226f0c1c5810906a),platform=Windows NT 10.0.14393 x86_64)
at WebDriverError (C:\Users\c-shouston\AppData\Roaming\npm\node_modules\protractor\node_modules\selenium-webdriver\lib\error.js:27:5)
at ScriptTimeoutError (C:\Users\c-shouston\AppData\Roaming\npm\node_modules\protractor\node_modules\selenium-webdriver\lib\error.js:203:5)
at Object.checkLegacyResponse (C:\Users\c-shouston\AppData\Roaming\npm\node_modules\protractor\node_modules\selenium-webdriver\lib\error.js:505:15)
at parseHttpResponse (C:\Users\c-shouston\AppData\Roaming\npm\node_modules\protractor\node_modules\selenium-webdriver\lib\http.js:509:13)
at doSend.then.response (C:\Users\c-shouston\AppData\Roaming\npm\node_modules\protractor\node_modules\selenium-webdriver\lib\http.js:440:13)
at process._tickCallback (internal/process/next_tick.js:109:7)
From: Task: Protractor.waitForAngular() - Locator: By(css selector, .header-text)
I've referenced the FAQ: https://github.com/angular/protractor/blob/master/docs/timeouts.md#waiting-for-angular
I have my devs stating that they don't use $timeout (they use (Edit: NOT $interval) Observable Interval thank you very much) and they're not sure about $http.
I found this solution about the canonical way to debug protractor Angular sync issue issue: Canonical way to debug Protractor-to-Angular sync issues
but I'm not sure the solution works without access to modifying the dev code to run the programmatic tracker. (Edit: I never did figure out how to get this to work)
I also found this about a long timeout you add before each test, but I feel this is unnecessary overhead that makes your overall test execution take longer than it should without understanding the root cause of the problem: https://stackoverflow.com/a/37217167/2718402 (Edit: yeah, this is a bad idea and adds unnecessary time to your tests, please don't do this)
The frustrating bit is that this seems to be a common occurrence and there doesn't seem to be a streamlined documentation on how to deal with it. Logging in with a non-Angular page only to transition to an Angular page. Angular pages not being picked up properly by Protractor. All of the examples I find online are bits of code that I don't have a reference for where they should be at in my overall test framework. I would kill for a full example of someone testing a non-Angular login that transitions to a fully Angular website, with a setup config and real world test cases. (Edit: This is still true, but I can't make one myself as my application is in a bad grey area, note my RCA below for more details.)
I just want the ability to do my login and then successfully transition over to my Angular pages and be able to rely on Protractor to work with my Angular pages. I need to know what to look for that may be a long running asynchronous process (What specifically can I check for in the Chrome dev tools?). I would love to understand what Protractor needs as defaults in order to successfully work with the Angular parts of my app/website (Is there something beyond the presence of <app-root _nghost-c0="" ng-version="4.3.2"> in the HTML?). Before this job I worked in Java, so all of this asynchronicity and Angular is new to me, so I know I'm missing the known things that a seasoned Javascript dev is aware of.
My Solution/Root Cause Analysis
Starting down the list suggested by #ernst-zwingli:
for Angular(2) Check if the object window.getAllAngularRootElements returns at least one value.
It returned at least one value, so I moved on.
useAllAngular2AppRoots: true,
I tried this and still ran into the async timeout.
And if $interval or other long lasting asynchronous tasks are used, there can be issues, because of the zones
Previously #ernst-zwingli also mentioned looking at the testability method, except it was the old way. Through research and testing I found the window object also has a getAllAngularTestabilities method. This led down an interesting rabbit hole. An example output from the Chrome console (put window.getAllAngularTestabilities() in the Chrome console window, look at the resulting list) is as follows:
t:
_callbacks:...,
_didWork:true,
_isZoneStable: true (this looks promising, but why isn't Protractor working then?!?)
_ngZone:
hasPendingMacrotasks: true,
hasPendingMicrotasks: false,
isStable: true
I would think isZoneStable would be enough, but apparently not so for Protractor. Then looking at Macrotasks being true, I had to look up what the heck a Macrotask was: What does hasPendingMacrotasks and hasPendingMicrotasks check for?.
A macrotask can be:
i.e. setTimeout, setInterval, setImmediate
Thus #ernst-zwingli's note about interval's causing problems in the zones was remembered and something finally clicked.
First github issue, about zone instability
Another github issue complaining about the necessity of using browser.driver to get things done along with browser.waitForAngularEnabled. Apparently this is expected behavior, it led me to issue #3349
Issue #3349 - The actual root cause of my issue. My developers do not actively jump in and out of zones around observables. Even though these observables only have one subscriber. Since they live in the angular zone at this time, they are a long running "Macrotask" that Protractor waits infinitely on.
I can't rewrite the code with these wrappers as I am not currently versed enough in Angular to do it safely and we are currently hurtling toward a November deadline. I think I'll have to deal with using browser.driver for the time being and hope I can't get it fixed later. Hopefully my RCA was helpful for you.

In the following I list a set of potential causes and possibilities to fix/resolve them.
How does AngularJS and Angular(2) Work / What can I check in the Browser Dev Mode
I can't explain it as well as Andrey Agibalov in his Blog here, so check it out (also for developers).
Basically, the objects required by Protractor you can check in your Chrome Dev.
for AngularJS
Check if the object window.angular is properly defined, i.e. lookup window.angular.version and also try window.angular.getTestability of your Root element
for Angular(2)
Check if the object window.getAllAngularRootElements returns at least one value.
Root Element (AngularJS)
Potentially your Angular App is somewhere wrapped within the Body as something like <div ng-app="my-app">.
In that case, you must adjust your rootElement: body inside config.ts. Check this answer for details.
Angular(2)
If you're using Angular (aka Angular2), then there are ngZone's introduced. In this case your config.js should additionally contain this:
exports.config = {
framework: 'jasmine',
seleniumAddress: 'http://localhost:4444/wd/hub',
specs: ['spec.js'],
useAllAngular2AppRoots: true,
// rootElement: 'root-element'
};
check in your browser for window.getAllAngularRootElements as the additional line in conf.js is about this.
If you can, maybe use the advantage of multiple zones possible. Create a 2nd zone, configure rootElement: 'root-element'
to only focus on one zone and then move some asynchronous tasks into the other zone until you found, which task(s) lead to timeout. Keep those tasks (if possible) in the separate zone, so Protractor ignores those tasks.
And if $interval or other long lasting asynchronous tasks are used, there can be issues, because of the zones. Repeatedly or long lasting tasks should be started outside the zone and then be moved into the zone as else Protractor could run into timeouts. There is a workaround for developers to apply, in order to avoid these problems for Protractor.
read all about it here
browser.driver. - side remark
browser.driver.get() works as if ignoreSynchronization = true, since you directly assign the Browser Driver and you kind of bypass the synchronization logic of Protractor.
Read more about it in this answer here.
Hope I could give you some more input and you can solve your issue. Please let me know the results.

Could you please set
browser.ignoreSynchronization = true;
and try

Cannot instantiate Rhino with math.js in another thread then UI on Android

I'm trying to use some JS script which has math.js included into it and some custom functions. Whole script takes around 1.5mb and it takes about 15 seconds to evaluate it using evaluateReader method of Rhino - though it's not possible to run it on UI thread. So we wrapped it into AsyncTask. Unfortunatelly running it from other thread then UI is making app to crash:
Caused by: org.mozilla.javascript.EvaluatorException: Too deep recursion while parsing (JavaScript#1133)
Line 1133 of our script is a part of math.js in Signature.prototype.expand:
for (i = 0; i < param.types.length; i++) {
recurse(signature, path.concat(new Param(param.types[i])));
}
I suppose that it can be somehow related to memory issues, as adding largeHeap to manifest helps, but only on some newer devices which allow it.
Is there any other solution that we can use that script and load it without blocking UI?
--- update 30.06
I've investigated memory management and it looks like this is some issue with memory. Rhino need additionall 25-30mb to get that script evaluated...

This answer is the closest I've found to a solution. Unfortunately, the documentation states that devices are not required to honor the stack size parameter. So it doesn't seem that there's a way to guarantee you can provide sufficient memory to avoid the "too deep recursion" error, which is a stack overflow error.

Browser.ExecScript() stopped working after updating windows

I've set up a simple testbed for WatiN (ver 2.1) which reads:
var browser = new IE();
browser.GoTo("http://www.google.co.il"); // webpage doesn't matter really
browser.RunScript("alert(123)");
This works only if KB3025390 is not installed. Installing it breaks the above test with an UnAuthorizedAccessException which has HRESULT set to E_ACCESSDENIED. What gives? Is there any workaround?
Update: Using IWebBrowser2.Navigate2 along with "javascript:console.log(123)" type of scripts works however
it makes me feel uneasy using such a backchannel
the scripts run through this back-channel of .Navigate2() may only have a max length of about 2070 chars (give or take) otherwise they get forcibly truncated to this length leading to javascript errors upon attempting to run them
using .Navigate2(), even with the most trivial script, will clog the ready state of Internet Explorer for good in the sense that it will be set to READYSTATE_LOADING without any hope of getting rid of it. In simple terms this means that once you use this hack, you either have to perform every single subsequent operation in WatiN in a "dont-wait-for-webpage-to-load" fashion (GoToNoWait, ClickNoWait etc) lest your code freezes upon waiting for the browser to turn back to READYSTATE_COMPLETE (which will never come about ofcourse as already mentioned).
there appears to be a much broader issue here in the sense that I can't even access the properties of an IHtmlWindow2 object p.e. window.document throws an unauthorized exception again making it virtually impossible to transfer over to the C# world the return-values of the scripts I'm running (using Expando etc) for documents other than window.top.document (for the window.top.document window there is IWebBrowser2.Document which does the trick)
Update#2: The folks over at the selenium project have also noticed this issue:
https://code.google.com/p/selenium/issues/detail?id=8302
A bug report has been created as well:
https://connect.microsoft.com/IE/feedback/details/1062093/installation-of-kb3025390-breaks-out-of-process-javascript-execution-in-ie11
Update#3: IHTMLWindow2.setInterval and IHTMLWindow2.setTimeout also throw UnauthorizedAccess exceptions. These methods are not marked as deprecated in:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/ko-kr/library/windows/desktop/aa741505%28v=vs.85%29.aspx
yet they have wounded up suffering from the same cutbacks all the same.
Update#4: I gave the approach recommended in this post a shot:
https://stackoverflow.com/a/18546866/863651
In order to dynamically invoke the "eval" method of the IHTMLWindow2 object (or any other method really). Got the same "System.UnauthorizedAccessException" as above. So no joy here either.
Microsoft recommends using "eval" over "execscript" however after the above experiment I suspect that they are refering to accessing "eval" only from within the browser.
As far as I can tell thus far, when it comes to the full-fledged IE11+ using "eval" out-of-process (via COM) appears to have been completely prohibited along with any other function-invocation of the window object, the only exception being the back-channel of the .Navigate2() mentioned above.

It turns out Microsoft eventually backpedaled on its decision to kill off .execScript at COM-level. Just install the latest updates for Windows including kb3025390: One of the updates for IE that came after kb3025390 brings back .execScript functionality at COM-level
Note, however, that .execScript is not accessible through IE's javascript anymore. In that context it's gone for good.

fyi: this one is also not working
ieInstance.Document.Script.<methodNameString>(<commaSeperatedParameterString>)
try this worked for me at some places but not all places
ieObject.Navigate "javascript:<methodNameString>(<commaSeperatedParameterString>)", Null, "_parent"
or
ieObject.Navigate2 "javascript:"<methodNameString>(<commaSeperatedParameterString>)", Null, "_parent"
now trying to find out solution using eval

I have found a way around the problem of an update installing automatically. You can just create a simple batch file with following content.
{code}
#echo off
wusa /uninstall /kb:3025390/quiet /norestart
END
{code}
Then go to task scheduler, create a new task for this batch file to run every one hour or day as per your requirements. Add it as a system task so it runs in the background and does not affect the running automations.

Illegal access Javascript error in Chrome

I have sporadically been getting an "illegal access" exception in Chrome (29 and 30). Others have also seen this. It seems to happen on one specific line:
Here, this is an object I defined. It has a property end which is null or a number.
Does anyone know of anything that could cause an error with that message in Chrome?
EDIT: I don't expect anyone to debug ten thousands of lines of my code. What could cause an error with that message, whether it be jumping off the moon, singing blues, etc?
There are no occurrences of "illegal" in all of the Javascript code on the page.
This error has not happened in later versions of Chrome (31+).
Hopefully this is gone for good.

According to https://github.com/highcharts/highcharts/issues/2443, this would help:
try {
delete ret['e'];
} catch (e) {} // do nothing

We can't be sure, but depending on your network speed, hardware, your DOM wasn't totally and perfectly loaded.
You was probaby using recursion, many of them, with some hard javascript computation on each.
What happened is all tags and scripts of the DOM was already loaded and parsed, so the script started anyway. But content data not fully.
The javascript addEventListener(DOMContentLoaded", ) is more watching tags and their good closures to start his job, instead of the real full data load.
This behavior is possible on other browsers.
While your script was for sure too loud on his time, the javascript engine on all browsers had evolved enough to handle it smoothly, mostly on the memory part which was clearly the funnel.

What causes Google Maps javascript exceptions?

I pretty consistently get GMaps API javascript exceptions that look like the following:
Ve.k is null or not an object (FF & IE)
b.k is null or not an object (FF & IE)
a is null (FF)
a.$e is undefined (FF)
Uncaught TypeError: Cannot read property 'k' of undefined (chrome)
Often the exception occurs during an eval of some expression in javascript in the bowels of the GMaps API
Almost anything can cause one of these to pop up, displaying an overlay on the map or a mouse click event for example.
I've been scouring my code for some time looking for offending overlays, and event handlers, but so far no relationship found. I've had this happen on a naked map with no overlays or handlers active.
Certain versions of the API will not crash on certain browsers, but it's hit and miss and I still have this sinking susspicion that something in the environment is giving GMaps a hard time (eg. maybe Facebook Connect, Google Analytics, my code...)
Does anyone have a handle on what causes these?

After spending quite a bit of time rolling back operations that affected the map 1 by 1, I finally got to the line(s) that caused this problem.
First, if I removed the call to setUIToDefault() the problem went away, this was unacceptable to me both because I wanted the default UI and that's a lame way to solve the problem. So many more map operations later I came to the GWT calls:
mapWidget.setHeight()
mapWidget.setWidth().
For those not familiar with GWT these two calls will ultimately translate to the following javascript template call:
element.style['height'] = height;
where 'element' in this case is the div that contains the map and height on the RHS of the expression is something like "690px".
That was all it took to derail the maps API.
The fix? Setting the size of the map div prior to instantiating the map.
You tell me, bug in the maps api or just a major feature lack? I'm going to check w/ the maps folks.

Just the perils of using a minified, obfuscated Javascript library I am afraid. There is no discrete group of errors that result in the exceptions you are seeing, but you can be sure that they are a result of a bug in your own code. I use Google maps pretty extensively and have regularly seen these types of errors. In 100% of cases, the bug was mine.
If you post (either here or in new questions) specific examples of pages that generate these errors, we can check them out and hopefully fix them.

I would have to guess it would be your code (not to say your a bad programmer) or another library interfering. I've been using the Google MAPS API happily for about 1 year now* and never had the first exception. The only time I've ever gotten an error message was when I was adding the balloon thingy.
*The website looks like crap but it was a high school project for my county fair and I couldn't use any server side stuff.
Edit: After reading your comment I'm wondering if you included a proper DOCTYPE? Check and see if you have it.