lodash

What is lodash?

Lodash is a JavaScript library that provides utility functions for common programming tasks using a functional programming paradigm. It includes functions for manipulating and traversing arrays, objects, and strings, as well as utilities for functions, language, math, number, object, sequence, and utility methods.

What are lodash's main functionalities?

Array Manipulation

Lodash provides a rich set of array manipulation functions such as map, filter, find, and sort. The code sample demonstrates sorting an array in ascending order using a custom comparator.

[3, 2, 1].sort(_.compareWith(function(a, b) { return a - b; }))

Object Manipulation

Lodash allows for easy manipulation and traversal of objects. The code sample shows how to assign properties from source objects to a destination object.

_.assign({ 'a': 1 }, { 'b': 2 }, { 'c': 3 })

String Manipulation

Lodash includes functions to manipulate strings, such as converting to different cases, trimming, padding, etc. The code sample demonstrates converting a string to kebab-case.

_.kebabCase('Foo Bar')

Function Utilities

Lodash provides function utilities like debounce and throttle to control function invocation. The code sample shows a debounced function that will only be invoked after 250 milliseconds have passed without it being called again.

_.debounce(function() { console.log('Debounced'); }, 250)

Language Utilities

Lodash includes utilities for deep cloning, merging, and comparing objects. The code sample demonstrates deep cloning an object to ensure nested objects are cloned as well.

_.cloneDeep({ 'a': 1, 'b': { 'c': 2 } })

Other packages similar to lodash

underscore

Underscore is a utility library with similar functionality to Lodash, offering a range of functions for manipulating arrays, objects, and functions. It is generally considered to be the predecessor to Lodash, which provides a superset of Underscore's features with additional performance optimizations.

ramda

Ramda is a functional programming library that emphasizes a more functional and composable approach compared to Lodash. It provides similar utilities but focuses on immutability and side-effect free functions, which can lead to a different programming style.

immutable

Immutable.js offers a different take on data manipulation by providing persistent immutable data structures. Unlike Lodash, which works with standard JavaScript objects and arrays, Immutable.js uses its own data structures, which can lead to better performance and easier reasoning about state changes in certain applications.

README

Lo-Dash v1.0.2

A utility library delivering consistency, customization, performance, & extras.

Download

• Lo-Dash builds (for modern environments):
  Development and Production

• Lo-Dash compatibility builds (for legacy and modern environments):
  Development and Production

• Underscore compatibility builds:
  Development and Production

• For optimal file size, create a custom build with only the features you need

Dive in

We’ve got API docs, benchmarks, and unit tests.

For a list of upcoming features, check out our roadmap.

The full changelog is available here.

Installation and usage

In browsers:

<script src="lodash.js"></script>

Using npm:

npm install lodash

npm install -g lodash
npm link lodash

To avoid potential issues, update npm before installing Lo-Dash:

npm install npm -g

In Node.js and RingoJS v0.8.0+:

var _ = require('lodash');

// or as a drop-in replacement for Underscore
var _ = require('lodash/lodash.underscore');

Note: If Lo-Dash is installed globally, run npm link lodash in your project’s root directory before requiring it.

In RingoJS v0.7.0-:

var _ = require('lodash')._;

In Rhino:

load('lodash.js');

In an AMD loader like RequireJS:

require({
  'paths': {
    'underscore': 'path/to/lodash'
  }
},
['underscore'], function(_) {
  console.log(_.VERSION);
});

Resources

For more information check out these articles, screencasts, and other videos over Lo-Dash:

• Posts

• Say “Hello” to Lo-Dash

• Videos

• Introducing Lo-Dash
• Lo-Dash optimizations and custom builds
• Lo-Dash’s origin and why it’s a better utility belt
• Unit testing in Lo-Dash
• Lo-Dash’s approach to native method use
• CascadiaJS: Lo-Dash for a better utility belt

Features

• AMD loader support (RequireJS, curl.js, etc.)
• _(…) supports intuitive chaining
• _.at for cherry-picking collection values
• _.bindKey for binding “lazy” defined methods
• _.cloneDeep for deep cloning arrays and objects
• _.contains accepts a fromIndex argument
• _.forEach is chainable and supports exiting iteration early
• _.forIn for iterating over an object’s own and inherited properties
• _.forOwn for iterating over an object’s own properties
• _.isPlainObject checks if values are created by the Object constructor
• _.merge for a deep _.extend
• _.partial and _.partialRight for partial application without this binding
• _.template supports “imports” options, ES6 template delimiters, and sourceURLs
• _.where supports deep object comparisons
• _.clone, _.omit, _.pick, and more… accept callback and thisArg arguments
• _.contains, _.size, _.toArray, and more… accept strings
• _.filter, _.find, _.map, and more… support “_.pluck” and “_.where” callback shorthands

Support

Lo-Dash has been tested in at least Chrome 524, Firefox 118, IE 6-10, Opera 9.25-12, Safari 3-6, Node.js 0.4.8-0.8.20, Narwhal 0.3.2, PhantomJS 1.8.1, RingoJS 0.9, and Rhino 1.7RC5.