[FIXED] Xpath. Get text of specified tags in order of appearance on the page

Issue

I am trying to get the text from h2, h3 and p tag on the page in the order they appear on html page. Example: All highlighted text should be extracted in this order.

When using the following xpath:

response.xpath('//*[name()=("h2", "h3","p")]/text()').extract()

Im getting the following error:

ValueError: XPath error: Invalid expression in //*[name()=("h2", "h3","p")]/text()

Where am I wrong? Is there another way to reach my goal?

Solution

You can achieve what you want by combining a few conditionals using or:

response.xpath('//*[name()="h2" or name()="h3" or name()="p"]/text()')

You could also select the same thing by combining a few paths and chaining multiple .xpath() calls:

response.xpath('//h2|//h3|//p').xpath('./text()')

I'm not sure if there are any performance differences, but I'd just go with the one you find easier to read.
If performance is a big concern, I recommend profiling both ways.

Answered By - stranac