Dotnet Error in 4.11.0 when using ChromeDriverService.CreateDefaultService()

TL;DR

For "Unable to obtain chrome using Selenium Manager": what works: Upgrade to Selenium 4.12 or newer. In 4.11 the.NET Service constructor treated a path without a trailing slash as a file instead of a directory, which broke ChromeDriverService.CreateDefaultService(); that was fixed for 4.12.

Unable to obtain chrome using Selenium Manager

Steps

1. What works:

Upgrade to Selenium 4.12 or newer. In 4.11 the .NET Service constructor treated a path without a trailing slash as a file instead of a directory, which broke ChromeDriverService.CreateDefaultService(); that was fixed for 4.12. From 4.11 on, you also do not need to manage drivers yourself: drop the manual service creation and let Selenium Manager download the driver.

2. If you unpack the NuGet by hand for PowerShell use, keep the layout intact: selenium-manager.exe goes in selenium-manager/windows/ next to Selenium.WebDriver.dll, and dependency DLLs like Newtonsoft.Json must sit beside the WebDriver DLL. A user confirmed the exact failing script worked after these fixes.

When to use

You are seeing this: What was reported: Issue SeleniumHQ/selenium#12564 (closed, 46 comments): ### What happened? Use this skill when you run into "Dotnet Error in 4.11.0 when using ChromeDriverService.CreateDefaultService()".

When not to use

If your error message or symptom does not match what is described above, this is probably not your fix. Search for your exact error text instead of forcing this one to fit.

Versions

Versions mentioned in the source: 4.11.0, 4.10.0. If you are on something much newer or older, the details may have shifted.

Why this happens

The original report does not dig into a root cause. It documents the symptom and the fix that resolved it.

Sources

• https://www.nuget.org/packages/Selenium.Support/
• https://www.nuget.org/packages/Selenium.WebDriver

In the GitHub issue, the reporter asked: Dotnet Error in 4.11.0 when using ChromeDriverService.CreateDefaultService(). The working answer that came out of the thread: Upgrade to Selenium 4.12 or newer. In 4.11 the .NET Service constructor treated a path without a trailing slash as a file instead of a directory, which broke ChromeDriverService.CreateDefaultService(); that was fixed for 4.12. From 4.11 on, you also do not need to manage drivers yourself: drop the manual service creation and let Selenium Manager download the driver.

If you unpack the NuGet by hand for PowerShell use, keep the layout intact: selenium-manager.exe goes in selenium-manager/windows/ next to Selenium.WebDriver.dll, and dependency DLLs like Newtonsoft.Json must sit beside the WebDriver DLL. A user confirmed the exact failing script worked after these fixes. Source: https://github.com/SeleniumHQ/selenium/issues/12564