Skip to main contentWhy we built global locator redirect
Many sites use a combination of semantically correct html tags (e.g.
<input type=”checkbox”>) combined with other elements to create components
that both look good and are accessible. Usually, what this looks like in
practice is an invisible input element covered by elements that are styled to
look like something (for example, a checkbox).
This can cause problems when using Momentic because the AI chooses elements from
the accessibility tree (i.e. the input), but we interact with the page as a
regular user would (i.e. clicking on the button). Often, the outcome is that the
element that the AI chose fails stability checks (is not visible, has no
bounding box, or is covered by another element), causing test failures. Because
of this, we need a way to get from the accessible element that the AI chose to
an element on the page that playwright can actually interact with.
How global locator redirect works
Global locator redirect works by hit testing points where the original element
is located. At each point, we determine the topmost element that is visible and
can be interacted with. If the original element is ever visible, we continue to
target that element. If the original element is never visible, we choose the
most common overlapping element that is also similar to the original. We
determine similarity by verifying that the elements are nearby in the DOM and
their bounding boxes are similar. This prevents us from redirecting to
overlapping elements that are obviously completely unrelated to the original.
Configuration options
Currently, global locator redirect has three configuration options:
-
Always: global locator redirect is used for all interactive steps that target
elements (click, type, etc.). For CLI users, this is the same as setting
globalLocatorRedirect to always in momentic.config.yaml.
-
Click only: this option exists for backwards-compatibility reasons. When
enabled, global locator redirect applies only to click steps. For CLI users,
this is the same as setting
globalLocatorRedirect to true in
momentic.config.yaml.
-
Never: global locator redirect is never used. For CLI users, this is the same
as setting
globalLocatorRedirect to false in momentic.config.yaml.
By default, global locator redirect is always enabled. 
