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How to open the Default Chrome Profile through Selenium, ChromeDriver and GoogleChrome

I want to load a new Selenium ChromeDriver that is using Chrome as if I open Chrome from my dock (Essentially it'll have all my extensions, history, etc.)
When I use the following code:
ChromeOptions options = new ChromeOptions();
options.AddArgument("user-data-dir=C:\\Users\\User\\AppData\\Local\\Google\\Chrome\\User Data\\");
options.AddArgument("disable-infobars");
options.AddArgument("--start-maximized");
ChromeDriver chromeDriver = new ChromeDriver(options);
It loads the Chrome browser with me signed into my Gmail and with all my extensions, just like I want, but the rest of my code:
chromeDriver.Navigate().GoToUrl("https://www.youtube.com/");
doesn't execute. But when I use the following
ChromeOptions options = new ChromeOptions();
options.AddArgument("user-data-dir=C:\\Users\\Andrea\\AppData\\Local\\Google\\Chrome\\User Data\\Default");
options.AddArgument("disable-infobars");
options.AddArgument("--start-maximized");
ChromeDriver chromeDriver = new ChromeDriver(options);
The rest of my code executes perfectly (Notice the 'Default' added to the end of the first Argument). Any tips or suggestions on how I can get the first block of code (The one without 'Default' on the end) to execute the rest of my program would be great. Thanks!

I know this is an old question, but what worked for me is to do remove the "C:\" and replace all of the backslashes with forward slashes. So, with that from the original question, this should work to load the default profile:
options.AddArgument("user-data-dir=/Users/User/AppData/Local/Google/Chrome/User Data");

The Default Chrome Profile which you use for your regular tasks may contain either/all of the following items:
History
Bookmarks
Cookies
Extensions
Themes
Customized Fonts
All these configurations untill and unless are part of your Test Specification it would be a overkill to load them into the session initiated by Selenium WebDriver. Hence it will be a better approach if you create a dedicated New Chrome Profile for your tests and configure it with all the required configuration.
Here you will find a detailed discussion on How to create and open a Chrome Profile
Once you have created the dedicated New Chrome Profile for your tests you can easily invoke the Chrome Profile as follows:
ChromeOptions options = new ChromeOptions();
options.AddArgument("user-data-dir=C:\\Users\\User\\AppData\\Local\\Google\\Chrome\\User Data\\Profile 2");
options.AddArgument("disable-infobars");
options.AddArgument("--start-maximized");
ChromeDriver chromeDriver = new ChromeDriver(options);
chromeDriver.Navigate().GoToUrl("https://www.youtube.com/");
Here you will find a detailed discussion on How to open URL through default Chrome profile using Python Selenium Webdriver

I have the same issue. I don't know how to fix it, I guess the root cause is white space in profile path.
I know a workaround for this. Just copy the C:\\Users\\Andrea\\AppData\\Local\\Google\\Chrome\\User Data to c:\myUserData (no space in the path).
Then add the argument.
options.AddArgument("user-data-dir=C:\\myUserData");

This is an Old question, but if you are facing this issue, all you have to do is close all tabs, Just shut down the chrome window..
Selenium can't use the data since it is already in use.
Hope you fond this helpful.

Automatically download from links in browser using c# watin

Trying to automate file downloads, using Watin in IE. Have a 10 documents to be downloaded and i could find that the below code will prompt for download option.
string download_url="link to file";
browser.Goto(download_url);
I would like to automatically save these files into a new directory with custom names for each files. Is it possible without user prompt for saving files in IE(vesrion 8 and above). Please guide me with a solution for this issue.

From your question I can find several other responses right here. Like this one:
Downloading a file with Watin in IE9
using(IE ie = new IE(someUrlToGoTo))
{
FileDownloadHandler fileDownloadHandler = new FileDownloadHandler(fullFileName);
ie.AddDialogHandler(fileDownloadHandler);
ie.Link("startDownloadLinkId").ClickNoWait();
fileDownloadHandler.WaitUntilFileDownloadDialogIsHandled(15);
fileDownloadHandler.WaitUntilDownloadCompleted(200);
}

Using a proxy with Selenium

for the past two days I've been trying to use a proxy with Selenium, that's not exactly the issue though. The issue is that the proxy is private meaning it needs authentication to use it (Username and Password) but I can't figure out how to do it.
I'm using a Firefox driver, with a profile like so:
FirefoxProfile firefoxProfile = new FirefoxProfile();
firefoxProfile.SetPreference("network.proxy.type", 1);
firefoxProfile.SetPreference("network.proxy.http", "23.95.115.87");
firefoxProfile.SetPreference("network.proxy.http_port", 80);
var driver = new FirefoxDriver(firefoxProfile);
driver.Navigate().GoToUrl("http://ipchicken.com");
I figured that it would ask me for the username and password (in a dialog box) yet nothing happens, it just navigates to the webpage, and displays my own IP. I can't find anything really on this, any help guys? Thank you so much.

I am not an expert in Selenium but I can help you in making your proxy authentication free.
If you are on Windows, download something like CC-Proxy ( Its free for a single user) and add your proxy as a cascading proxy. This will create a local proxy server on your computer which won't require username/password. Then you can use the local proxy server in selenium.
If you are on Linux, you can use wine to run CC-Proxy or you can use tinyproxy or squid ( it is an overkill).
Comment if you face problem in setting up CC-Proxy or tinyproxy.

http authorization with webdriver and popup window

I'm trying to use Selenium WebDriver to automatically login in to a site with a user-name and password. I've done my research and I don't believe this feature is supported by WebDriver, so I need to find another way. The site I'm trying to automate logging into is located here.
When prompted to login a popup window comes up that doesn't seem to be part of the browser. I'm using Firefox and Chrome. It seems Windows API may be required? I already tried passing the credentials in the URL but that didn't work. Also tried sendkeys, but received a Windows exception that the application was not accepting Windows messages. I also tried switching the current handle using driver.windowhandles but the popup doesn't seem to be a new handle.
Does anybody have any ideas? I'm kinda stuck. The preliminary code to get to the popup window is:
IWebDriver driver = new FirefoxDriver();
driver.Navigate().GoToUrl("http://www.portal.adp.com");
string currentWindow = driver.CurrentWindowHandle;
IWebElement userLogin = driver.FindElement(By.Id("employee"));
userLogin.Click();

The popup you are seeing is prompted by web server and is a authentication prompt. Selenium doesn't support this operation.
One of the way to handle this limitation is to pass user and password in the url like like below:
http://user:password#example.com
More info available here : http://aleetesting.blogspot.in/2011/10/selenium-webdriver-tips.html

I wanted my answer out there because I think I've solved it. This answer does not require passing the credentials through the URL (for those of you that are unable to like me). It also does not require any custom Firefox Profiles or extensions to be installed or included with the solution or installed onto the browser eliminating cross-machine compatibility issues.
The issue with me was that the authentication could not be completed via passing the credentials through the URL because the login was behind a proxy.
So, I turned to windows automation toolkits and found AutoIT. Using AutoIT and Selenium, you can login automatically by sending the username and password to the windows dialog that appears. Here's how (note the steps below are for c#:
1 - Download AutoIT from http://www.autoitscript.com/site/autoit/downloads/
2 - Add the autoit .dll to your project references.
Right click on references, select Add Reference. Next click the browse button and browse to the dll location (most default installations it will be c:\Program Files (x86)\AutoIt3\AutoItX\AutoItX3.dll), and add to project.
3 - use AutoIT and Selenium like this (assuming your web driver is already initialized):
//Initialize AutoIT
var AutoIT = new AutoItX3();
//Set Selenium page load timeout to 2 seconds so it doesn't wait forever
Driver.Manage().Timeouts().SetPageLoadTimeout(TimeSpan.FromSeconds(2));
//Ingore the error
try
{
Driver.Url = url;
}
catch
{
return;
}
//Wait for the authentication window to appear, then send username and password
AutoIT.WinWait("Authentication Required");
AutoIT.WinActivate("Authentication Required");
AutoIT.Send("username");
AutoIT.Send("{TAB}");
AutoIt.Send("password");
AutoIT.Send("{ENTER}");
//Return Selenium page timeout to infinity again
Driver.Manage().Timeouts().SetPageLoadTimeout(TimeSpan.FromSeconds(-1));
Anyway, that's it, and it works like a charm :)
Also note that there are some special characters that need to be escaped in AutoIT using the sequence "{x}". For example, if your password is "!tRocks", you'd need to pass it into AutoIT as "{!}tRocks".
Happy automating.

FirefoxProfile profile = new FirefoxProfile();
profile.SetPreference("network.http.phishy-userpass-length", 255);
profile.SetPreference("network.automatic-ntlm-auth.trusted-uris", hostname);
Driver = new FirefoxDriver(profile);
hostname is your URL (example.com) then try to
Driver.Navigate().GoToUrl(http://user:password#example.com);

I just got done working on a prototype project that is supposed to handle exactly this kind of situation.
It utilizes BrowserMob, a popular open source proxy, to perform the authentication.
SeleniumBasicAuthWrapper Hope it helps! It is still a work in progress, but hopefully we'll get any kinks or defects ironed out in the near future.

Change Browser download folder using C#

Is there a way I could change the download folder of the default web browser using c#.

Concurring with other's comments, you can only do it in a desktop app if you have the right permissions.
Here's some sample code to find out the default browser of the system (from this post):
private string getDefaultBrowser()
{
string browser = string.Empty;
RegistryKey key = null;
try
{
key = Registry.ClassesRoot.OpenSubKey(#"HTTP\shell\open\command", false);
//trim off quotes
browser = key.GetValue(null).ToString().ToLower().Replace("\"", "");
if (!browser.EndsWith("exe"))
{
//get rid of everything after the ".exe"
browser = browser.Substring(0, browser.LastIndexOf(".exe")+4);
}
}
finally
{
if (key != null) key.Close();
}
return browser;
}
However, things get tricky from here. Different browsers have different ways of saving the default location.
E.g.,
IE may store it in registry (usually under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\ Software\ Microsoft\ Internet Explorer)
FF stores it in prefs.js in Profile folder (checkout this post to get to it via code)
Not sure about Chrome and Safari
but you get the idea.
Not sure what your end goal is, but from a UX standpoint, I think the best thing to do would be to ask user to specify the Download directory (in other words, you expose a Setting in your App for the default download location).

To expand on Ash's comment - if you're within a web app, no. If you're a desktop app, and you have sufficient permissions (i.e. running as Administrator), probably. But you'd need to find the default browser (from the registry presumably) and know how to set the download folder for each popular browser, or every browser you want to work with.

Where are you trying to do this from? If you mean "someone hits our website and ...", the answer is no, as anything you run is in a security context. You can certainly suggest the user changes the folder, but you are stuck.
Assuming you are not a web application, you have options. The main user download directory is located at X under the key {374DE290-123F-4565-9164-39C4925E467B}. Yeah, that sounds like a lot of fun. You can learn how to hack the registry programatically here. But, the user can specify a specific folder in the browser, as well. This means you have to know what browser the user is using and hack it, or you can attempt to hack all.
The bad news is the app, running (most likely) in the user context, may not have administrator rights and be able to whack the registry keys to change the folder.