Cant insert text - a msg that the element is not visible is displayed - selenium

Question

I run automation on a site that after I click on a button and a screen of PayPal is opened for inserting details. The PayPal is opened in another tab. I added a syntax that move the testing to the relevant tab and then I insert a syntax that checks that the "email input" field exists (to check that it is really goes to the correct tab) - and the result of this test :- field exists.
Then - I add a syntax for the same field to insert the email and the test is failed - the text is not inserted and there is a msg that the field is not visible.
No need to do scroll because the filed is in the top of the screen.
What can I do in this case?
This is the relevant code:
String oldTab = driver.getWindowHandle();
comOps.clickOrChose(PLS.buyButton);
Thread.sleep(4000);
ArrayList<String> newTab = new ArrayList<String> (driver.getWindowHandles());
newTab.remove(oldTab);
driver.switchTo().window(newTab.get(0));
comOps.verifyElementExist(PLP.payPalEmail);
comOps.insertText(PLP.payPalEmail, "paypal-buyer#makeitleo.com");

Answer 1

The reason you get this error message is that the element apparently exists but is not visible when you try to enter text to it. There are a lot of possible reasons why the element is not visible.
Given that a new tab is opended a probable reason is that the page (and its elements) is still loading. If this is the case, you need to wait for the visiblity of the element, e.g. using this piece of code (before inserting text):
WebDriverWait wait = new WebDriverWait(driver, 300); //waiting up to 5 minutes
ExpectedCondition<WebElement> condition =
ExpectedConditions.visibilityOf(PLP.payPalEmail);
wait.until(condition);
Note: that this solution assumes that PLP.payPalEmail is of type org.openqa.selenium.WebElement. If it is of type org.openqa.selenium.By use visibilityOfElementLocated(By locator).
Telling from your code snippet, I assume that comOps is an object of a class wrapping all Selenium actions. So, it is a good idea to place the above code in some method inside that class which could look like this:
public void verifyElementVisible(WebElement element) {
WebDriverWait wait = new WebDriverWait(driver, 300); //ToDo: use configurable timeout
ExpectedCondition<WebElement> condition =
ExpectedConditions.visibilityOf(element);
wait.until(condition);
}
and call it like this
comOps.verifyElementVisible(PLP.payPalEmail);