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Victor Chan
Victor Chan

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7 Useful Javascript Tips

7 Useful Javascript Tips

Without further ado, lets dive into it:

  1. Filtering falsy values:

If you have an array of values, you can filter out falsy values(null undefined 0 "" NaN false ) with Boolean()

//Example 1
const x = ["a","",3,false,"hello",undefined]
const y = x.filter(Boolean);

console.log(y) // ["a",3,"hello"]

//Use it like this
myArray.filter(Boolean);

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2. Floor a decimal number instead of Math.floor()
Useful for when you want to show whole numbers
(Edit: This removes decimal numbers so it actually acts like Math.ceil() for negative numbers, credits to @veljko94pesic)

//Example 1 
const x = 1.5 
const y = ~~x   
console.log(y) // Equals 1  
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//Example 2
const a = -1.5
const b = ~~a
console.log(b) // Equals -1
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//Example 3 
const z = ~~2.73123 
console.log(z) // Equals 2   

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3. Implicit boolean coercion
Change a value into a boolean (Instead of Boolean(value))

const x = {} 
const y = !!x //Equals true 
console.log(y) // true

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4. Last items in an array
You can use Array.slice() with negative indicies to count backwards.

let array = [0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8]  

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console.log(array.slice(-1)); // Equals [8]

console.log(array.slice(-2)); // Equals [7, 8]

console.log(array.slice(-3)); // Equals [6, 7, 8]

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5. Implicit number coercion using +

Putting a + in front of any value will attempt to change it to a number, similar to Number(value). This can also be used for Date objects as an alternative to Date.getTime()

//Example 1 
const x = new Date() 
const y = +x 
console.log(y) //Equals 1591887393586 (gives back time in ms)

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Useful for doing this (get time 10 seconds later)

const z = new Date(+new Date() + 10 *1000)
console.log(z) //Equals 1591887403586

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6.Method parameter validation
Lets you throw an error if input not given

const isRequired = () => { throw new Error('param is required'); };

const print = (value = isRequired()) => {   
    console.log(`${value}`)  
};  

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print(2);// Equals  2  
print()// Throws error  
print(null)// Equals null

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7.Swallow errors for promise all

Normally, Promise.all() will throw if any promises inside its array rejects. We can ignore errors by using map and catch for each promise.

const promiseArray = [
    Promise.reject(null),
    Promise.resolve(100),
    Promise.resolve("More data"),
    Promise.reject(new Error('Throw an error here'))
];

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//Map and catch for promises 
//And just console.log them 
const all = await Promise.all(
    promiseArray.map(p => p.catch(console.log))
)

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Thats all!
Do you have any Javascript tips?
Feel free to leave them as a comment below πŸ™‚

Top comments (16)

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tovvaar profile image
Λ—ΛΛ‹γƒˆγƒγƒΌΛŽΛŠΛ—

On the last one perhaps there is a formatting error, since comment is affecting the const declaration:

//Map and catch for promises 
//And just console.log them 
const all = await Promise.all(
    promiseArray.map(p => p.catch(console.log))
)
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__victorchan profile image
Victor Chan

Thanks, I'll give it an edit!

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alvechy profile image
Alexander Vechy

Thanks for sharing. It's good to know tricks even if it's not good to use them.
Example with implicit number coercion on Date is misleading. I'll be disappointed to see it in some produciton code.

new Date(+new Date() + 10 *1000)
// vs
new Date(Date.now() + 10 * 1000)
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__victorchan profile image
Victor Chan

Ahh true, that looks much more understandable. Thanks for the feedback!

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westim profile image
Tim West

From my experience, 2, 3 & 5 aren't significantly faster and make the code harder to read/understand. I avoid these by enabling eslint rules to disable implicit coercion.

Tip 7 can soon be replaced by the new ES2020 Promise.allSettled() feature.

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__victorchan profile image
Victor Chan

True, readability is a good point. Thanks for the feedback!

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jonrandy profile image
Jon Randy πŸŽ–οΈ

Shorter way to filter falsey values:

myArray.filter(x=>x)
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veljko94pesic profile image
veljko94pesic

Maybe you should mention that double tilde operator (~~) for negative numbers acts like Math.ceil() function, in your example:

const x = -1.5
const y = ~~x

console.log(y) // Equals -1

Nice article btw :)

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__victorchan profile image
Victor Chan

Awesome, didn't know about that. Thanks for sharing!

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miketalbot profile image
Mike Talbot ⭐

Nice - I learned one there. I've mostly used |0 to floor numbers but I like the ~~ prefix style a lot too. I like the parameter validation one too. That's nice.

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__victorchan profile image
Victor Chan

Oh awesome, didn't know about that one, thank you!

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shriji profile image
Shriji

Nice!

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duhbhavesh profile image
Bhavesh Kasturi

Nice!

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kpulkit29 profile image
Pulkit Kashyap

Awesome read

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abdulrayhman profile image
Abdul Rehman

Informative in short way Thanks