Behat, MinkExtension & Selenium2 Driver - select a NodeElement

GetElementFeatureContext.php

<?php
/**
 * those functions allos me to use only 1 Step definitio to get an element, even if I don't use the same
 * parameters to get it.
 * You can search with:
 * - the xpath (Which can be really tricky sometimes)
 * - an attribute of the element : id (the best) or name or value
 * - the css (the more used)
 * I pass the type of element and the element above but you can only use css and xpath (as the attributes
 * can also be used on the css)
 *
 * @author netraagal
 */

namespace App\Features;

use Behat\Mink\Driver\Selenium2Driver;
use Behat\Mink\Element\NodeElement;
use Behat\Mink\Exception\ElementNotFoundException;
use \Exception;

/**
 * select an element based on it's type an any value which can identify it:
 * - xpath | css | css attribute (name|id|value)
 */
class GetElementFeatureContext extends MinkContext implements SnippetAcceptingContext
{
  
  /**
   * iSelect
   *
   * @When /^(?:|I )select "(?P<element>[^"]+)" (?:|of type )"(?P<type>[^"]+)"$/
   * @When /^(?:|I )select "(?P<type>[^"]+)" "(?P<element>[^"]+)"$/
   *
   * @param   string  $element
   * @param   string  $type
   * @return  NodeElement
   */
  public function iSelect($element, $type): NodeElement
  {
    return $this->getElement($element, $type);
  }
  
  
  /**
   * getElement
   *
   * @param  string       $element
   * @param  string       $type
   * @return  NodeElement
   * @throws Exception
   */
    protected function getElement($element, $type): NodeElement
    {
        $value = null;
        
        if (substr($element, 0, 2) === "//") //xpath
        {
            try {
                $value = $this->assertSession()->elementExists('xpath', $element);
            }
            catch (ElementNotFoundException $e) {
                $value = null;
            }
        }
        else { //simple string
            $value = $this->getElementByCSS($element, $type);
        }

        if ($value === null)
        {
            throw new Exception(
                sprintf(
                    "Error : research on NodeElement with '%s' and type '%s' has returned null",
                    $element,
                    $type
                )
            );
        }
        return $value;
        
    }

    /**
     * getElementByCSS
     *
     * @param   string  $value
     * @param   string  $type
     * @return  NodeElement|null
     */
    protected function getElementByCSS($value, $type): ?NodeElement
    {
        try {
            $element = $this->assertSession()->elementExists('css', $value);
        }
        catch(ElementNotFoundException $e) {
            
            $element = $this->getElementByCSSAttribute($value, $type);
        }
        return $element;
    }

    /**
     * getElementByCSSAttribute
     *
     * @param   string    $selector
     * @param   string    $value
     * @param   string    $type
     * @return  NodeElement|null
     */
    protected function getElementByCSSAttribute($value, $type, string $selector = "id"): ?NodeElement
    {
        try {
            $element = $this->assertSession()->elementExists('css', $type."[".$selector."='".$value."']");
        }
        catch(ElementNotFoundException $e) {
            
            if ($selector === "id")
                $element = $this->getElementByCSSAttribute($value, $type, "name");
            else if ($selector === "name")
                $element = $this->getElementByCSSAttribute($value,  $type, "value");
            else
                $element = null;
        }

        return $element;
    }
}