object-bystring

object-bystring

Access and alter deeply nested object properties by string notation

Purpose

Let's say you want to change a something nested in this object:

var objA = {
  name: "tamb",
  address: {
    street: "123 fake street",
    town: "fake town",
    zip: "00000",
    state: "Fake State",
    city: "Fake City",
    POBoxes: [1234, 23213, 2321],
  },
  dependents: [
    {
      name: "John Doe",
      age: 55,
    },
    {
      name: "Jane Doe",
      age: 44,
    },
  ],
};

You coould easily write objA.dependents[1].age = 45;
Or even var indx = 1; objA.dependents[indx].age = 45;

No issue here.

But let's say you are trying to pass along an object (objB) of commands. Those commands should dictate what to change in objA.

How do you easily do this?

{
 'address.street': '345 Faker Way',
 'dependents[1].age': 45,
 'address.POBoxes[2]': 43278
}

With byString you can generate paths to object values and either set or get those values.

Latest Docs:

https://github.com/tamb/object-bystring

Demo

https://codesandbox.io/embed/object-bystring-demo-i3845d?fontsize=14&hidenavigation=1&theme=dark

installation

npm install --save object-bystring

Usage

You can import either a utility method, or a polyfill to add this functionality to the Object prototype.

// util method
const bystring = require("object-bystring");
import byString from "object-bystring";

Using the example above:

Setting Values

byString(object, key, value)

byString(objectA, "path.to.field", "new value");

Getting Values

byString(object, key);

const finger = byString(person, "arm[0].hand.fingers[3]");

const randomFinger = byString(person`arm[0].hand.fingers[${number}]`);

Attribution

Thank you, Ray for the original Stackoverflow answer, which is the majority of the source code. https://stackoverflow.com/questions/6491463/accessing-nested-javascript-objects-with-string-key

Check out his github and so profile below:

https://github.com/raybellis

https://stackoverflow.com/users/6782/alnitak