Fill in Input Box on Website with VBA - html

Question

I've been banging my head against he wall trying to figure out why this VBA code will not work :(
I am simply trying to insert the value entered into the excel input box into a website's input box. I am a novice when it comes to HTML so I'm sure that has something to do with it.
Here is the HTML element from the website Zomato.com:
<input class="dark" id="location_input" role="combobox" aria-expanded="true" aria-labelledby="label_search_location" aria-owns="explore-location-suggest" aria-autocomplete="list" placeholder="Please type a location...">
Here is my VBA code:
Sub Merchant_Extraction()
Dim IE As Object
Dim form As Variant
Dim button As Variant
Set IE = CreateObject("internetexplorer.application")
merchantzip = InputBox("Enter Zip Code")
With IE
.Visible = True
.navigate ("http://www.zomato.com")
While IE.readystate <> 4
DoEvents
Wend
IE.Document.GetElementByID(“location_input_sp”).Item.innertext = merchantzip
Set form = IE.Document.getelementsbytagname("form")
Set button = form(0).onsubmit
form(0).get
End With
Set IE = Nothing
End Sub
I am unclear why it's not working - any help would be incredible!

Answer 1

API XMLHTTP GET request
The API was mentioned. The documention is here.
The basic free account allows access to restaurant information and search APIs (up to 1000 calls/day).
An example first 0-20 results call, with a city id specified (68 for Manchester,UK), is as follows; a JSON response is received. The response it parsed into a JSON object with JSONConverter.bas
Option Explicit
Public Sub GetInfo()
Dim URL As String, strJSON As String, json As Object
URL = "https://developers.zomato.com/api/v2.1/search?entity_id=68&entity_type=city&start=0&count=20"
With CreateObject("MSXML2.XMLHTTP")
.Open "GET", URL, False
.setRequestHeader "Content-Type", "application/json"
.setRequestHeader "user-key", "yourAPIkey"
.send
strJSON = .responseText
End With
Set json = JsonConverter.ParseJson(strJSON)
'other stuff with JSON object
End Sub
Example JSON response:
Zomato - Common APIs:
Finding your city ID:
The quickest way for me was to go to concatenate the city onto a base URL string e.g. https://www.zomato.com/manchester, then click search and right-click inspect HTML on first result. Then Ctrl+F to bring up search box, search for CITY_ID, and scan through find results for the HTML until city id found e.g.

Answer 2

As far as entering values into webpages the correct syntax would be:
IE.Document.all.Item("location_input").Value = ""
I've combined your routine with some code that I use so you can see an example. I have not been able to test however. In my environment, the IE object disconnects after the .navigate portion so I added in a loop to find and re-assign the object...
Option Explicit
Public Declare Sub Sleep Lib "kernel32" (ByVal dwMilliseconds As Long)
Sub Merchant_Extraction()
Dim IE As Object, objShellWindows As Object
Dim MerchantZip As String, strWebPath As String
Dim Form As Variant, Button As Variant
Dim X As Long
strWebPath = "http://www.zomato.com"
MerchantZip = InputBox("Enter Zip Code")
If MerchantZip = vbNullString Then Exit Sub
Set IE = CreateObject("InternetExplorer.Application")
With IE
.Visible = True
.Navigate strWebPath
End With
Do
Sleep 250
DoEvents
Loop While IE.Busy Or IE.ReadyState <> 4
If TypeName(IE) <> "IWebBrowser2" Or IE.Name <> "Internet Explorer" Then
Set objShellWindows = CreateObject("Shell.Application").Windows
For X = 0 To objShellWindows.Count - 1
Set IE = objShellWindows.Item(X)
If Not IE Is Nothing Then
If IE.Name = "Internet Explorer" Then
If InStr(1, IE.LocationURL, strWebPath, 1) > 0 Then
Do While IE.Busy Or IE.ReadyState <> 4
Sleep 250
DoEvents
Loop
Exit For
End If
End If
End If
Set IE = Nothing
Next
Set objShellWindows = Nothing
End If
If Not IE Is Nothing Then
IE.Document.all.Item("location_input").Value = MerchantZip
Sleep 250
For Each Button In IE.Document.getelementsbytagname("form")
If StrComp(Button.Type, "Button", 1) = 0 Then
Button.Click
End If
Next
Set IE = Nothing
End If
End Sub