Publishing post about InvalidSelectorException

[deploy site]

Author: diemol

website_and_docs/content/blog/2023/InvalidSelectorException_is_changing.md

@@ -0,0 +1,49 @@
+---
+title: "InvalidSelectorException has changed"
+linkTitle: "InvalidSelectorException has changed"
+date: 2023-04-21
+tags: ["webdriver", "java", "dotnet", "exceptions"]
+categories: ["general"]
+author: Mohab Mohie ([MohabMohie](https://github.com/MohabMohie/MohabMohie))
+description: >
+  ⚠️ `InvalidSelectorException` now extends from `WebDriverException`
+---
+
+Before Selenium 4.8.2 in Java and C#, when an invalid locator was used to identify an element, the resulting behavior would be 
+inconsistent in our bindings.
+
+For example, let's check the following code:
+
+```java
+ArrayList<Class<? extends Exception>> expectedExceptions = new ArrayList<>();
+        expectedExceptions.add(org.openqa.selenium.NoSuchElementException.class);
+        expectedExceptions.add(org.openqa.selenium.StaleElementReferenceException.class);
+        expectedExceptions.add(org.openqa.selenium.ElementNotInteractableException.class);
+        expectedExceptions.add(org.openqa.selenium.InvalidElementStateException.class);
+        
+return new FluentWait<>(driver)
+      .withTimeout(Duration.ofMillis(ELEMENT_IDENTIFICATION_TIMEOUT))
+      .pollingEvery(Duration.ofMillis(ELEMENT_IDENTIFICATION_POLLING_DELAY))
+      .ignoreAll(expectedExceptions)
+      .until(nestedDriver -> {
+         nestedDriver.findElement(By.xpath("invalid-xpath")).click;
+      });
+```
+
+The expected result *before this change* would be that the driver waits until the timeout expires and then throw an `InvalidSelectorException`.
+
+This doesn't make much sense because a broken/invalid selector would never fix itself, and hence should throw immediately. 
+
+This was discussed and agreed during the [TLC meeting on August 17, 2022](https://www.selenium.dev/meetings/2022/tlc-08-17/#proposals),
+and implemented through the pull request [11727](https://github.com/SeleniumHQ/selenium/pull/11727) and the following 
+[commit](https://github.com/SeleniumHQ/selenium/commit/f28144eb72ae1df18f267a5250db6b9b41dc1fdc).
+
+With the changes mentioned above, an invalid selector will throw an `InvalidSelectorException` immediately.
+
+Please note that this may have an impact on backwards compatibility if you are not expecting this exception to be thrown while 
+handling invalid locators.
+
+Stay tuned for updates by following [SeleniumHQ](https://twitter.com/seleniumhq)!
+
+Happy testing!
+