Accessing nested JavaScript objects and arrays by string path

ES6: Only one line in Vanila JS (it return null if don't find instead of giving error):

'path.string'.split('.').reduce((p,c)=>p&&p[c]||null, MyOBJ)

Or example:

'a.b.c'.split('.').reduce((p,c)=>p&&p[c]||null, {a:{b:{c:1}}})

With Optional chaining operator:

'a.b.c'.split('.').reduce((p,c)=>p?.[c], {a:{b:{c:1}}})

For a ready to use function that also recognizes false, 0 and negative number and accept default values as parameter:

const resolvePath = (object, path, defaultValue) => path
   .split('.')
   .reduce((o, p) => o ? o[p] : defaultValue, object)

Example to use:

resolvePath(window,'document.body') => <body>
resolvePath(window,'document.body.xyz') => undefined
resolvePath(window,'document.body.xyz', null) => null
resolvePath(window,'document.body.xyz', 1) => 1

Bonus:

To set a path (Requested by @rob-gordon) you can use:

const setPath = (object, path, value) => path
   .split('.')
   .reduce((o,p,i) => o[p] = path.split('.').length === ++i ? value : o[p] || {}, object)

Example:

let myVar = {}
setPath(myVar, 'a.b.c', 42) => 42
console.log(myVar) => {a: {b: {c: 42}}}

Access array with []:

const resolvePath = (object, path, defaultValue) => path
   .split(/[\.\[\]\'\"]/)
   .filter(p => p)
   .reduce((o, p) => o ? o[p] : defaultValue, object)

Example:

const myVar = {a:{b:[{c:1}]}}
resolvePath(myVar,'a.b[0].c') => 1
resolvePath(myVar,'a["b"][\'0\'].c') => 1

This is the solution I use:

function resolve(path, obj=self, separator='.') {
    var properties = Array.isArray(path) ? path : path.split(separator)
    return properties.reduce((prev, curr) => prev && prev[curr], obj)
}

Example usage:

// accessing property path on global scope
resolve("document.body.style.width")
// or
resolve("style.width", document.body)

// accessing array indexes
// (someObject has been defined in the question)
resolve("part3.0.size", someObject) // returns '10'

// accessing non-existent properties
// returns undefined when intermediate properties are not defined:
resolve('properties.that.do.not.exist', {hello:'world'})

// accessing properties with unusual keys by changing the separator
var obj = { object: { 'a.property.name.with.periods': 42 } }
resolve('object->a.property.name.with.periods', obj, '->') // returns 42

// accessing properties with unusual keys by passing a property name array
resolve(['object', 'a.property.name.with.periods'], obj) // returns 42

Limitations:

  • Can't use brackets ([]) for array indices—though specifying array indices between the separator token (e.g., .) works fine as shown above.

I just made this based on some similar code I already had, it appears to work:

Object.byString = function(o, s) {
    s = s.replace(/\[(\w+)\]/g, '.$1'); // convert indexes to properties
    s = s.replace(/^\./, '');           // strip a leading dot
    var a = s.split('.');
    for (var i = 0, n = a.length; i < n; ++i) {
        var k = a[i];
        if (k in o) {
            o = o[k];
        } else {
            return;
        }
    }
    return o;
}

Usage::

Object.byString(someObj, 'part3[0].name');

See a working demo at http://jsfiddle.net/alnitak/hEsys/

EDIT some have noticed that this code will throw an error if passed a string where the left-most indexes don't correspond to a correctly nested entry within the object. This is a valid concern, but IMHO best addressed with a try / catch block when calling, rather than having this function silently return undefined for an invalid index.


This is now supported by lodash using _.get(obj, property). See https://lodash.com/docs#get

Example from the docs:

var object = { 'a': [{ 'b': { 'c': 3 } }] };

_.get(object, 'a[0].b.c');
// → 3

_.get(object, ['a', '0', 'b', 'c']);
// → 3

_.get(object, 'a.b.c', 'default');
// → 'default'

Tags:

Javascript

Jquery

Nested

Path

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