if you want to know whether the input element is a textbox or a radio, you should get the element's 'type' attribute value not the element's tag name or node name, for example:

    public void testInputType() throws Exception {
        selenium.open("http://www.google.com/");
        //assert the search button's type is submit
        assertEquals("submit", selenium.getAttribute("btnG@type"));
    }

Hi,

I'm not aware for the Java syntax but in C# it would be

String nodeName = selenium.GetEval("this.page().findElement('<locator>').nodeName")

Where <locator> is your xpath or id or whatever.

After this statement nodeName should contain the name of the html tag, e.g. INPUT, SELECT, DIV, etc.

I hope this helps and you can modify it for Java and use it