JavaScript Fundamentals 2024

JavaScript was created in 1995 as a way to add programs to web pages in the Netscape Navigator browser. Today the language has been adopted by all the other major web browsers, and it has become one of the most popular programming languages in the world.

In this tutorial, we are going to explore the fundamentals of JavaScript and discuss how to use it to create web applications, as both the frontend and the backend.

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Setting up the environment

This tutorial comes with many example code snippets. To execute the them, open up you browser, and go to Developer Tools -> Console:

Or you can install Node.js on your computer, which allows you to run JavaScript programs using command terminals.

You can refer to the linked article for details on how to set up Node.js on your computer.

Data types in JavaScript

In the computer world, it's all about data. What a computer program does is essentially take some input data, process them, and then return some output data. In this section, let's talk about some different types of data that JavaScript can process.

Numbers

Numbers are the easiest because it works exactly like what you studied in your math class in elementary school.

1// Integer
2100;
3
4// Fractional Number
510.56;
6
7//Scientific Notation
83.14e5; // 3.14 * 10^5 = 314000

The primary usage of numbers is to perform arithmetic operations.

13 + 5 * 2; // -> 13

Just like you studied in elementary school, multiplications and divisions happen first. However, you can change this by using parentheses.

1(3 + 5) * 2; // -> 16

There is one operator that you might not recognize, which is the modulo (%) operation. X % Y calculates the remainder of dividing X by Y. For example:

125 % 5; // -> 0
2
325 % 10; // -> 5
4
525 % 15; // -> 10

Strings

Strings are used to represent texts, and they are all enclosed in quotes like this:

1"This is a string.";
2"This is also a string.";

Both single and double quotes work exactly the same, as long as the opening and the closing quotes match each other.

Whenever a backslash (\) is found inside a string, it means the character after it has a special meaning. For example, when the backslash is followed by the letter n (\n), this will be interpreted by your computer as a new line:

1"This is the first line\nThis is the second line";

The output text would look like this:

1This is the first line
2This is the second line

The + operation can also be used on strings as well. But obviously, strings can not be used in arithmetic operations, the plus sign here means concatenate (connecting two strings together).

1"con" + "cat" + "e" + "nate"; // -> "concatenate"

Finally, there is a special kind of string in JavaScript, the backtick-quoted strings, usually called template literals. It allows us to embed other values inside the string:

1`half of 100 is ${100 / 2}`;

In this example, the division inside ${} will be calculated, the result will be converted into a string and printed in that position. So this example will give us:

1half of 100 is 50

Boolean values

The Boolean type only includes two values, true and false. Comparison is the most common way to produce boolean values.

1console.log(1 == 1); // -> true
2
3console.log(1 > 2); // -> false
4
5console.log(1 < 0); // -> false
6
7console.log(1 != 2); // -> true

In this example, == means equal, and != means not equal. Other similar operators include >= (greater than or equal to) and <= (less than or equal to).

There are three logical operators that we can apply to Boolean values in JavaScript, && (and), || (or), and ! (not).

The && operator denotes logical and, it produces true only if both values given to it are true.

1console.log(true && false); // -> false
2
3console.log(false && true); // -> false
4
5console.log(false && false); // -> false
6
7console.log(true && true); // -> true

The || operator denotes logical or, it produces true if either of the values given to it is true.

1console.log(true || false); // -> true
2
3console.log(false || true); // -> true
4
5console.log(false || false); // -> false
6
7console.log(true || true); // -> true

The ! operator denotes logical not, and it flips the given value.

1console.log(!true); // -> false
2
3console.log(!false); // -> true

We can also mix arithmetic operations with comparisons and logical operations.

11 + 1 == 2 && 1 + 1 < 0;

In this example, 1 + 1 == 2 gives us true, and 1 + 1 < 0 gives us false, so we have

1true && false; // -> false

Empty values

There are two special values in JavaScript, null and undefined. They indicate the absence of a meaningful value. In computer programs, there are a lot of operations that do not produce meaningful results (which we will see later in this course), and these results will be denoted by null or undefined.

These two values have virtually no difference, in fact, in most cases, you can treat them as interchangeable. The fact that there are two different values indicating the same thing is just an accident of JavaScript's design.

Data type conversion

JavaScript is a very intelligent programming language, it will always try to execute the program you give it, even though the program does not make sense. For example:

1console.log(8 * null); // -> 0
2
3console.log("5" - 1); // -> 4
4
5console.log("5" + 1); // -> "51"

In the first example, the null gets converted into the number 0, and in the second example, the string "5" becomes the number 5. However, in the third example, the number 1 gets converted into the string "1", and the plus sign here means concatenate, so the result becomes "51".

Yes, these results are all over the place, and they don't make sense at all. This is why you should never try to do this when you are coding, even though it "works", it will lead to unexpected results.

Program structures in JavaScript

Statements and bindings

In computer programming, you can think of a "program" as an instruction manual to solve a complex problem. Each instruction/sentence in that manual is called a statement. In JavaScript, a statement should always end with a semicolon(;).

1let num = 10;

This example is called a binding, or variable. It binds the value 10 to the name num using the = operator, which allows us to do something like this:

1let num = 10;
2console.log(num * num); // -> 100

The keyword let indicates that this statement is going to define a binding. When a binding is formed, it does not mean that the name is tied to the value forever, we can still use the = operator on existing bindings.

1let num = 10;
2console.log(num); // -> 10
3
4num = 20;
5console.log(num); // -> 20

Notice that we only used the keyword let in line 1. That is because let is only used to declare a binding, and in line 5, we are merely updating the value that is tied to the variable num.

1let num1 = 10;
2let num2 = 20;
3
4console.log(num1); // -> 10
5console.log(num2); // -> 20
6
7num2 = num1;
8
9console.log(num1); // -> 10
10console.log(num2); // -> 10

1let num = 10;
2num = num - 5;
3
4console.log(num); // -> 5

The keywords const and var can also be used to create bindings just like let, however, they are different in terms of scopes, which we will in detail later.

Functions

A function is a piece of program that returns a value or has some side effects, or both. For example, the console.log() function we have seen a few times is used to output values in the terminal.

Or, in this example, the prompt() function will show you a dialog that asks for user input, and that input will be bound with the variable num.

1let num = prompt("Enter A Number");
2console.log(num);

Both showing a dialog and writing text to screen are side effects. A function can also be useful without the side effect. For example:

1console.log(Math.max(2, 4, 6, 8));

The Math.max() function does not have any side effects, it simply takes a set of numbers and returns the greatest.

All of these functions are built into JavaScript. We can, however, create our own functions using JavaScript. We will discuss this topic in the next section.

if statements

The if statement offers us a way to execute different pieces of code under different conditions. For example:

1let num = prompt("Enter A Number");
2
3if (num < 10) {
4  console.log("Small");
5} else {
6  console.log("Large");
7}

This program asks you to input a number, if the number is less than 10, console.log("Small"); will be executed, and the program will output "Small". If the number is larger than 10, the program will output "Large".

We can also chain multiple if/else pairs if there are multiple conditions we need to consider:

1if (num < 10) {
2  console.log("Small");
3} else if (num < 100) {
4  console.log("Medium");
5} else {
6  console.log("Large");
7}

This program will first check if the number is less than 10, if it is, it will output "Small". If the number is greater than 10, the program will then check if it is less than 100. If it is, the program will output "Medium". Finally, if the number is greater than 100, the program will show "Large".

for loops

The for loops offer us a way to execute the same code over and over again, as long as some conditions are satisfied.

1for (let num = 0; num <= 12; num = num + 2) {
2  console.log(num);
3}

A for loop takes three expressions, separated by two semicolons. In this example, the first expression let num = 0 declares a new variable num, whose initial value is 0. The second expression means the loop will iterate until the condition num <= 12 is violated (num is larger than 12). The last expression means for each iteration, num will add itself by 2.

while loops

while loops work in a similar way, except it only takes one expression. In fact, we can easily change our previous for loop example into a while loop.

1let num = 0;
2while (num <= 12) {
3  console.log(num);
4  num = num + 2;
5}

In this example, we initiated the num variable first, outside of the while loop. Inside the parentheses, after the keyword while is the expression that checks whether the loop should continue. Finally, we update the value of num at the end of the while loop.

do while loops

A do-while loop differs from a while loop only on one point, it guarantees that the body of the loop executes at least once.

1let num = 10;
2do {
3  num = num + 1;
4  console.log(num);
5} while (num <= 1);

This time the initial value of num is 10, which violates the condition for the loop to continue. But because this is a do-while loop, the body is still executed once. If this was a while loop, it would not execute at all.

Breaking out of a loop

Violating the condition for the loop to continue is not the only way we can stop a loop. For instance, you are asked to find a number that is greater than 100, and divisible by 9 (Recall that % operator is used to calculate reminder, so if the remainder of x/9 equals 0, that means x is divisible by 9.). We can use a for loop to solve this problem:

1for (let num = 100; ; num = num + 1) {
2  if (num % 9 == 0) {
3    console.log(num);
4    break;
5  }
6}

Notice that we do not have an expression that decides whether the loop should continue. Instead, we have an if statement with a break keyword inside, which will break out of the loop if it is executed. If you remove the break keyword, this for loop becomes an infinite loop and will run forever, which is something you should always avoid.

Functions in JavaScript

Previously, we've seen some functions that come with JavaScript. In this section, we are going to focus on defining our own custom functions in JavaScript. A function can be seen as a piece of code wrapped in a value, which allows us to reuse that piece of code over and over again. In this tutorial, we are going to talk about three different ways we can define a function in JavaScript.

The first method is to define functions as values, and bind that value to a name (like how we defined variables previously).

1let square = function (x) {
2  return x * x;
3};

The function is created with the keyword function, and it will take a set of parameters as input, in this case, only x. A function should also have a body where you return an output using the keyword return, or have some kind of side effect. Lastly, the function as a value will be assigned to the name square, which we need to use to invoke this function.

Also, remember that the semicolon (;) at the end is necessary because it is still a full statement where you declare a binding, except the value here is a function.

1console.log(square(10)); // -> 100

A function can have more than one parameter or no parameters at all (an empty set of parameters).

1const sleep = function () {
2  console.log("zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz");
3};

1var multiply3 = function (x, y, z) {
2  return x * y * z;
3};

As you can see, it is possible for a function to have only a side effect and not return anything.

The second method is slightly shorter, by declaring a function using the function keyword, and it doesn't require a semicolon at the end:

1function square(x) {
2  return x * x;
3}

The method also allows us to do something like this:

1sleep();
2multiply3(2, 3, 4);
3
4function sleep() {
5  console.log("zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz");
6}
7
8function multiply3(x, y, z) {
9  return x * y * z;
10}

Here we put the function declarations after the statement that calls them, and the code still works. Now, we can put all the functions in one place, which is a good thing for future maintenance.

The third method is called arrow functions. Instead of the keyword function, we can use an arrow (=>) to declare a function.

1const square = (x) => {
2  return x * x;
3};

This is the exact same square() function we saw before, and it works exactly the same. Then why does JavaScript have both arrow functions and the function keyword? While, in some cases, it allows us to write shorter functions.

If the function only has one parameter, then you can omit the parentheses around the parameter list. And if there is only one statement in the function body, the curly braces and the return keyword can also be omitted. Then, our square() function becomes:

1const square = (x) => x * x;

Bindings and scopes

Before we go deeper into the topic of functions, let's go back to the first method. You may have noticed that we defined the functions in the examples using different keywords, let, const and var. What exactly are their differences?

First, we need to understand the concept of scope. It is the part of the program in which the binding is accessible. If a binding is defined outside of any functions or blocks (blocks can be if statements, for or while loops, etc.), then you can refer to that binding wherever you want. This is called a global binding.

If the binding is declared inside a function or block using let or const, that binding will only be accessible from inside the function/block, and that is called a local binding. However, if the binding is defined using the keyword var, then that binding will also be accessible from outside of the function/block.

1let x = 10;
2
3if (true) {
4  let y = 20;
5  var z = 30;
6  console.log(x + y + z); // -> all three variables are accessible here
7}
8
9console.log(x + z); // -> you cannot "see" y from here, but z is still accessible

Now, what are the differences between let and const? As the name suggests, const stands for constant, meaning once a binding is declared using const, you cannot change its value (unlike let).

Optional arguments

JavaScript is very broad-minded when it comes to the number of parameters you pass to the function. For example, we have the square() function we defined before, which is supposed to take one argument.

1function square(x) {
2  return x * x;
3}
4console.log(square(4, true, "qwerty"));

In this example, we gave the square() function more than one argument, and it simply ignores the extra arguments and computes the square of the first one.

And if we passed too few arguments, those missing parameters will be assigned the value undefined instead of giving you an error.

The downside of this is, of course, when you accidentally make a mistake, no one will tell you about it. So, even though it technically works, you should never rely on this, it could give you some unexpected results. Instead, you should always be careful how many parameters you need, and how many arguments you are passing to the function.

Rest parameters

However, what if you don't know how many parameters you need? For example, you are designing a function that finds the maximum number in a series of numbers, but you don't know how many numbers are in the series, so you need to design a function that takes any number of arguments.

To write a function like this, you need to put three dots before the function's last parameter:

1function max(...numbers) {
2  let result = -Infinity;
3  for (let number of numbers) {
4    if (number > result) {
5      result = number;
6    }
7  }
8  return result;
9}
10
11max(1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7);

Now, the parameter numbers (it is called the rest parameter) will be bound to an array, and the function will return the maximum number in that array.

An array is a list of items, in this case, we have [ 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 ], and for (let number of numbers) is how we can iterate over all items in this array. We'll discuss arrays in JavaScript later.

Recursions in JavaScript

Finally, let's talk about the concept of recursion. Recursion is when a function calls itself. The most typical example is how we calculate the power of a number.

1function power(base, exponent) {
2  if (exponent == 0) {
3    return 1;
4  } else {
5    return base * power(base, exponent - 1);
6  }
7}

Notice that in line 5, the function power() called itself with parameters base and exponent - 1. This is a bit confusing, but don't worry, to understand this code, let's plug in some numbers. Let's try to calculate 10^5 (10 to the power of 5).

In the first step, we simply plug in the numbers, and the function returns 10 * power(10, 4). Then we need to calculate power(10, 4). Plug in the numbers, and we get 10 * power(10, 3), which means power(10, 5) equals 10 * 10 * power(10, 3).

And we keep repeating the same steps until we get 10 * 10 * 10 * 10 * 10 * power(10, 0). Because power(10, 0) returns 1, eventually we get power(10, 5) equals 10 * 10 * 10 * 10 * 10.

This is a very elegant way of defining exponentiation, but unfortunately, this method is about three times slower than using loops in JavaScript. This is a dilemma that programmers face all the time, we have to choose between simplicity and speed because almost any program can be made faster by making it bigger. It's up to the programmer to decide on an appropriate balance.

Creating arrays in JavaScript

Previously, we discussed some data types that are built into JavaScript, such as strings, numbers, and Boolean values. In this section, we are going to talk about two new data types that allow us to group all of these values together to create more complex structures, they are called arrays and objects.

Let's first talk about arrays. An array is a list of values wrapped inside a pair of square brackets, separated by commas.

1let listOfNumbers = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5];
2
3let listOfStrings = ["1", "2", "3", "4", "5"];

We can access the elements in the array by referring to their index number, which starts from 0 instead of 1. This is a very common thing in computer programming, you should get used to it.

1let x = listOfNumbers[0]; // x = 1 (index 0 is the first element)
2
3let y = listOfNumbers[2]; // y = 3 (index 2 is the third element)

What if we want to access the last element of the array, and we don't know the length of the array? Instead of trying every index starting from 0 to see if it gives a value, we can access the length of the array using arrayName.length. The length here is called a property and . is how we can access the property of a value. For example:

1let z = listOfNumbers[listOfNumbers.length - 1]; // z = 5

In this example, listOfNumbers.length gives us 5, because we start from 1 when we calculate length. However, since the index always starts from 0, that means the index of the last element should be 1 less than the length, hence the listOfNumbers.length - 1 here. We'll discuss properties and methods (properties with function values) in detail later.

It is also possible to change the values in the array.

1let listOfNumbers = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5];
2listOfNumbers[2] = 100;
3
4// listOfNumbers = [1, 2, 100, 4, 5];

Array loops

In some cases, we may need to iterate over the entire array and access each element one by one. There are two different ways we can do this in JavaScript.

1let list = [...];
2
3for (let e of list) {
4   ...
5   // Do something with the variable e
6}

This is the method we've seen before, for every iteration, the variable e will be assigned the next element in the array list, and you can do something with the variable e inside that for loop.

The second method is to use the index.

1for (let i = 0; i < list.length; i++) {
2  let e = list[i];
3}

In this example, the variable i is bound to the index of the array elements, and e is bound to the array element with the index i. The expression i++ is a shorthand notation of i = i + 1.

Stacks and queues

Stacks and queues are two very important data structures in computer programming, which we can implement using arrays.

A stack is a structure of elements based on the principle of last in first out (LIFO). It is like a stack of books. If you want to add a new book to the stack, you would put it on the top, and if you want to remove a book, you would remove the one on the top as well.

The stack data structure has two fundamental operations:

• The push operation is used to insert a new element onto the stack.
• The pop operation is used to remove the most recent element from the stack and return its value.

Luckily, JavaScript offers these two methods out of the package. To use them we can, again, use the . operator, because methods are just properties with function values:

1let stack = [];
2
3stack.push(2);
4stack.push(5);
5stack.push(7);
6stack.push(9);
7stack.push(7);
8
9console.log(stack); // -> [2, 5, 7, 9, 7]
10
11stack.pop(); // -> returns 7
12stack.pop(); // -> returns 9
13stack.pop(); // -> returns 7
14stack.pop(); // -> returns 5
15stack.pop(); // -> returns 2
16
17console.log(stack); // -> []

A queue is another very useful data structure. It is very similar to stacks, except it follows the first in first out (FIFO) principle. It's like waiting in line in a restaurant, if you come first, you will get the food first.

The queue data structure has two fundamental operations as well:

• The enqueue operation is used to insert a new element at the end of the queue.
• The dequeue operation is used to remove the element at the beginning of the queue and return its value.

There are also two methods built into JavaScript that help us with these two operations, however, the terminologies are a bit different. For the enqueue operation, we can use the push() method, because it pushes the new element to the end of the array. As for the dequeue operation, we can use the shift() method, which removes the first element of the array.

1let queue = [];
2
3queue.push(2);
4queue.push(5);
5queue.push(7);
6queue.push(9);
7queue.push(7);
8
9console.log(queue);
10
11queue.shift();
12queue.shift();
13queue.shift();
14queue.shift();
15queue.shift();

Objects in JavaScript

Properties and methods

Now, let's take a closer look at the concept of property which we were just talking about. We've seen some strange-looking expressions like listOfNumbers.length and Math.max. These are expressions that access the property of some value. In the first example, we access the length property of the listOfNumbers array. In the second example, we access the max property in the Math object.

Almost all of the data types we talked about have built-in properties. For example, a string also has a length property just like arrays, which store the length of that string.

In addition to the length property that only holds a number, there are also a number of properties that hold function values. For instance, we could use the toUpperCase property of a string to get a copy of that string in which all letters in that string are converted to uppercase. We usually refer to these properties with function values as methods.

1let string = "abCDefg";
2console.log(string.toUpperCase()); // -> "ABCDEFG"
3console.log(string); // -> "abCDefg"

Notice that invoking the toUpperCase() method does not change the string variable's original value.

Write our own properties

All of the properties we've talked about so far are built-in properties, and they all come with JavaScript. But, what if we want to create our own properties? Objects are the second data type we are going to discuss here which allows us to create our own properties.

An object is an arbitrary collection of properties, defined using the curly braces {}. For example, here we define an object named house:

1let house = {
2  members: 4,
3  names: ["Mason", "Robert", "Lara", "Wynne"],
4};

Inside the braces is a list of properties separated by commas. Each property is defined in name: value format.

In this example, there are four members in the house. To access that information, we can use the same notation we used before, with a dot (.).

1console.log(house.members); // -> 4

The objects are also mutable, which means their values can be modified. We can do that by using the = operator. For example:

1house.members = 5;
2
3console.log(house.members); // -> 5

However, this only applies to the properties we created ourselves. The properties of the other data types, such as strings, numbers, and arrays, their properties are immutable, and cannot be modified. For instance, if you have a string that contains "cat", it is not possible for you to write some code to change a character in that string to make it spell "rat".

JSON

Before we move on, we are going to introduce another data structure that is widely used in the web dev field, called JSON.

When you define a property (name: value), the name does not actually contain its value. Instead, it is stored in the computer memory as an address, which points to the location in the memory where the value is stored.

If you want to save the data in a file or send it to someone else over the internet, you'll have to somehow convert these tangles of memory address into a description that can be stored or sent over the internet. This process is called serialization, which means the data is converted into a flat description. A popular serialization format is called JSON(JavaScript Object Notation, pronounced "Jason").

JSON looks just JavaScript's way of defining objects, with a few extra restrictions. The property names have to be surrounded by double quotes, and no functions or anything that involves actual computation, only the simple data types are allowed. So, if we express our house object in JSON format, it would look like this:

1{
2  "members": 4,
3  "names": ["Mason", "Robert", "Lara", "Wynne"]
4}

JSON is widely used as a data storage and communication format on the web, even in languages other than JavaScript. We will encounter it again as we talk about backend development in the future.

What is object-oriented programming

In the previous section, we talked about a new data type called the objects. In computer programming, objects are not just a simple data structure, it is very commonly used as a way to organize code. Programmers would group values and functions with close relationships to each other, and put them in the same object, which makes them easier to access. This method of organizing your code is called object-oriented programming. In this section, we'll discuss how these ideas could be applied in JavaScript.

Encapsulation

The core idea of object-oriented programming is to split a program into small pieces, and each piece only minds its own business. People working on other pieces of code don't need to know how this piece of code is written, or that it even exists.

Sometimes the different pieces need to communicate with each other to perform a more complicated task. To make this work, programmers would create a property/method inside the object that is allowed to talk to the outside, this method is said to be made public, and they are usually referred to as the interface. While the actual implementation is hidden inside the object as private properties, meaning they cannot be seen or accessed by the outside code. This way of separating the interface from the implementation is called encapsulation.

Most programming languages have very distinctive methods of denoting public and private properties, usually with keywords public and private. JavaScript, however, does not have this functionality built-in, at least not yet. But JavaScript programmers still follow this idea of encapsulation, by putting an underscore character (_) at the beginning of the properties that should be made private. But since this is not JavaScript's built-in functionality, technically you could still access these properties from the outside, but that is something you should never do, for security reasons.

Methods

As you know, methods are just properties with functions as their values. This is a simple method:

1// Create a new empty object
2let rabbit = {};
3
4// Add a method named speak() to the empty object
5rabbit.speak = function (line) {
6  console.log(`The rabbit says '${line}'`);
7};
8
9// Excute the mathod
10rabbit.speak("I'm alive.");

Sometimes, the method needs to do something to the object it was called on, such as taking two numbers that are stored in the object, and adding them up, or taking a string value from the object and processing it. To do this, we can use the this keyword, which is a binding that automatically points to the object that was called on. Let's take a look at an example:

1// Create the method named speak()
2function speak(line) {
3  console.log(`The ${this.type} rabbit says '${line}'`);
4}
5
6/*
7Create an object named whiteRabbit, with two properties, "type"
8and "speak". By using the "this" keyword in the method "speak",
9we are able to access the "type" property in the same object.
10*/
11
12// In this case, this.type = "white".
13let whiteRabbit = { type: "white", speak };
14
15// In this case, this.type = "hungry".
16let hungryRabbit = { type: "hungry", speak };

Prototypes

Look at the following code:

1// Create an empty object
2let empty = {};
3
4console.log(empty.toString); // -> function toString(){...}
5console.log(empty.toString); // -> [object Object]

Notice that even though we defined an empty object, we still manage to pull a property from it. Well, technically, that property is not from the object, it's from the object's prototype. A prototype is basically another object on which our empty object is based, and it acts as a fallback source of properties. If you are trying to access a property that does not exist in the object, JavaScript will automatically search its prototype for that property.

JavaScript offers a method (Object.getPrototypeOf()) that returns the prototype of a data type. For example, let's try finding out the prototype of that empty object we just created:

1console.log(Object.getPrototypeOf(empty)); // -> {..., constructor: Object(), ...}
2
3console.log(Object.getPrototypeOf(empty) == Object.prototype); // -> true

The Object.prototype is the ancestral root of all objects that we create, but not all data types share the same prototype. For instance, the functions derive from Function.prototype, and arrays derive from Array.prototype.

1console.log(Object.getPrototypeOf([]) == Array.prototype); // -> true
2
3console.log(Object.getPrototypeOf(Math.max) == Function.prototype); // -> true

However, since those prototypes are still just objects, they also have a prototype, and that is usually Object.project. This is why almost all of the data types we've talked about have a toString method that converts objects into a string representation.

In fact, we can create our own prototype and use Object.create() method to create objects using a specific prototype.

1// Create an object, which we'll use as a prototype
2let protoRabbit = {
3  speak(line) {
4    console.log(`The ${this.type} rabbit says '${line}'`);
5  },
6};
7
8// Create a new object using the protoRabbit as the prototype
9let killerRabbit = Object.create(protoRabbit);
10
11killerRabbit.type = "killer";
12
13// Try to access the speak() method from the killerRabbit object
14killerRabbit.speak("SKREEEE!"); // -> The killer rabbit says 'SKREEE!'

Classes

In object-oriented programming, there is a concept called class, which works just like the prototypes. A class defines the shape of a type of object (just like prototypes), what kind of properties and methods it has. Such an object is called an instance of the class.

To create an instance of the class, we need to make a new object, which derives from the prototype/class. But you also have to make sure that the object has the properties that an instance of the class is supposed to have, not just the ones derived from the prototype/class. This is what a constructor function does.

1// An example of a constructor function
2function makeRabbit(type) {
3  // Create a new object using protoRabbit as prototype
4  let rabbit = Object.create(protoRabbit);
5
6  // Add a property named "type".
7  // Note that the senond "type" is the variable that is passed to the function
8  rabbit.type = type;
9
10  // returns the newly created object
11  return rabbit;
12}

If you are familiar with other programming languages that follow the idea of object-oriented programming, you'll see that this is a very awkward way of defining a class and constructor function, but it does help you understand what a constructor function is. Luckily, after 2015, JavaScript offered us a new and more standard way of making a class, by using the keyword class.

1let Rabbit = class Rabbit {
2  constructor(type) {
3    this.type = type;
4  }
5  speak(line) {
6    console.log(`The ${this.type} rabbit says '${line}'`);
7  }
8};

To create an instance of this class, we can use the keyword new.

1let killerRabbit = new Rabbit("killer");
2let blackRabbit = new Rabbit("black");

The constructor() function which we defined in the class will be automatically executed when you run this code.

Getters, setters, and statics

Now, let's focus on the interface part of object-oriented programming. In case you forgot, the interface is the part of the object that can be "seen" from the outside. Programmers use the interface to make different pieces of code work together to solve a complex problem.

There are typically two types of these interface methods, getters and setters. Getters retrieves information from the object, and setters write information to the object. Let's consider this example of a temperature converter.

1class Temperature {
2  constructor(celsius) {
3    this.celsius = celsius;
4  }
5  get fahrenheit() {
6    return this.celsius * 1.8 + 32;
7  }
8  set fahrenheit(value) {
9    this.celsius = (value - 32) / 1.8;
10  }
11
12  static fromFahrenheit(value) {
13    return new Temperature((value - 32) / 1.8);
14  }
15}
16
17let temp = new Temperature(22);

Notice that we have a static method in this example. Statics are not part of the interface, they are in charge of attaching additional properties to your constructor function, instead of the prototype. In our example, it is used to provide a different way of creating a class instance, using Fahrenheit.

Inheritance

JavaScript also provides us with an easy way to create a class based on another class, with new definitions of some of its properties. For example, the following class defines a matrix. In case you don't know, a matrix is a two-dimensional array.

1class Matrix {
2  constructor(width, height, element = (x, y) => undefined) {
3    this.width = width;
4    this.height = height;
5    this.content = [];
6
7    for (let y = 0; y < height; y++) {
8      for (let x = 0; x < width; x++) {
9        this.content[y * width + x] = element(x, y);
10      }
11    }
12  }
13
14  get(x, y) {
15    return this.content[y * this.width + x];
16  }
17  set(x, y, value) {
18    this.content[y * this.width + x] = value;
19  }
20}

There is another type of matrix that is called a symmetric matrix. It has all the characteristics of a regular matrix, except it is symmetric along its diagonal. To create such a matrix and avoid rewriting the same code all over again, we can make the SymmetricMatrix extends the Matrix class like this:

1class SymmetricMatrix extends Matrix {
2  constructor(size, element = (x, y) => undefined) {
3    super(size, size, (x, y) => {
4      if (x < y) return element(y, x);
5      else return element(x, y);
6    });
7  }
8
9  set(x, y, value) {
10    super.set(x, y, value);
11    if (x != y) {
12      super.set(y, x, value);
13    }
14  }
15}
16
17let matrix = new SymmetricMatrix(5, (x, y) => `${x},${y}`);
18console.log(matrix.get(2, 3)); // → 3,2

Exploring the DOM structure in JavaScript

Starting from this point, we are going to dive into the practical application of the JavaScript language in web development. We'll talk about how JavaScript, HTML, and CSS can work together to make your web pages more appealing and interactive.

Let's start with a quick review of the document object model. Here is a simple HTML document:

1<!doctype html>
2<html lang="en">
3  <head>
4    <title>Example Page</title>
5  </head>
6
7  <body>
8    <h1>Example Page</h1>
9    <p>
10      Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit.Lorem ipsum dolor
11      sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit.
12    </p>
13    <div>
14      <p>
15        Vestibulum fringilla lorem ac elit suscipit, nec suscipit nunc posuere.
16      </p>
17      <p>
18        Proin efficitur eros scelerisque consequat
19        <a href="https://www.ericsdevblog.com/">pulvinar</a>.
20      </p>
21    </div>
22  </body>
23</html>

Each HTML element can be seen as a box. For example, the example document has the following structure:

For each box, JavaScript automatically creates a corresponding object, which we can interact with to find out more details about that box, such as its content, attributes, etc. This kind of representation is referred to as the document object model, or DOM for short.

The second important feature of this DOM structure is that the boxes are all connected to each other, which means if we pick a starting point, it is possible for us to move to any other node on the page. For example, the <body> node has three child elements, <h1>, <p> and <div>. The <div> node has another two paragraphs (<p>) has child elements. So, to locate the paragraph with a link (<a>) in this example document, we can go from <html> to <body> to <div> and finally, locate the <p> node.

JavaScript and HTML

To import JavaScript code into an HTML document, we can use the <script> </script> tag.

1<!doctype html>
2<html lang="en">
3  <head>
4    <title>Example Page</title>
5  </head>
6
7  <body>
8    ...
9
10    <!--JavaScript-->
11    <script>
12      ...
13    </script>
14
15    <!--JavaScript in External File-->
16    <script src="myScript.js"></script>
17  </body>
18</html>

It is customary to put the JavaScript code before the end of the <body> tag. There are two ways to insert JavaScript, just like CSS, you can put it together with HTML, or you can put JavaScript in a separate file. For this tutorial, to make things easier, we'll put HTML and JavaScript code together.

JavaScript treats each DOM box as an object, and that allows us to access any element in the HTML document using the global binding document. For example, document.body refers to the <body> element of the document.

1...
2<body>
3  ...
4  <!--JavaScript-->
5  <script>
6    // Access body element
7    let body_element = document.body;
8
9    // Access h1 element
10    let h1_element = document.body.firstElementChild;
11    console.log(h1_element.tagName);
12
13    // Access paragraph element (with link)
14    let p_element = document.body.childNodes[5].lastElementChild;
15    console.log(p_element.tagName);
16  </script>
17</body>

Go to Developer Tools -> Console in your browser, and you should see that the correct tag names have been returned.

Notice that the index number we use to locate the <div> element is 5, that is because the childNodes() method will return not only element nodes but also text nodes and comment nodes. For example, a paragraph element would have an element node <p>, and a text node, which is its content.

In web development, it is possible to reach any specific element in the document by starting at document.body and following a fixed path of properties. However, even though that's possible, it's still a bad idea, especially when you have a big HTML document with a complicated relationship tree. It is very easy to make a mistake. Luckily, JavaScript offers us some smarter ways of locating elements in an HTML document.

Locating HTML elements using JavaScript

We mentioned before that JavaScript treats all HTML elements as objects, which implies there are built-in methods for us to use. In fact, there are several different ways we can locate elements in an HTML file using JavaScript, and they actually work a lot like the selectors we talked about in our CSS course.

For instance, all HTML elements have a getElementsByTagName() method, which helps us locate elements with a specific tag.

1<body>
2  <h1>Example Page</h1>
3  <p class="paragraphs">
4    Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit.Lorem ipsum dolor
5    sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit.
6  </p>
7  <div>
8    <p class="paragraphs paragraphs_div">
9      Vestibulum fringilla lorem ac elit suscipit, nec suscipit nunc posuere.
10    </p>
11    <p class="paragraphs paragraphs_div" id="paragraph_link">
12      Proin efficitur eros scelerisque consequat
13      <a href="https://www.ericsdevblog.com/">pulvinar</a>.
14    </p>
15  </div>
16
17  <!--JavaScript-->
18  <script>
19    // Get all paragraph elements
20    let p_elements = document.body.getElementsByTagName("p");
21  </script>
22</body>

This method will return a collection of elements with the specified tag, and you can access each one of them by specifying the index number, just like an array.

1<!--JavaScript-->
2<script>
3  // Get all paragraph elements
4  let p_elements = document.body.getElementsByTagName("p");
5
6  // Get the second paragraph element and print its content
7  let second_p = p_elements[1];
8  console.log(second_p.innerHTML);
9</script>

However, do not confuse this collection with an actual array, they are very similar, but not entirely the same. We cannot loop over it using for/of loop, we have to use the index numbers and run over the elements using a regular for loop. Or we can transform this collection into an array using Array.from method.

Once we've found the element we are looking for, we can access the attribute and content of that element using the dot (.) operator, and we can change their values as well:

1<!--JavaScript-->
2<script>
3  // Get all paragraph elements
4  let p_elements = document.body.getElementsByTagName("p");
5
6  // Get the second <p> element
7  let second_p = p_elements[1];
8
9  // Print its content
10  console.log(second_p.innerHTML);
11
12  // Change its content
13  second_p.innerHTML = "Changed content.";
14
15  // Print its attributes
16  console.log(second_p.attributes);
17
18  // Access one of the attributes
19  console.log(second_p.getAttribute("class"));
20</script>

The second method is document.getElementById(), it is used to find one single element, instead of returning a collection of elements. Note that this method does not exist under every element object, there is no document.body.getElementById().

1<!--JavaScript-->
2<script>
3  // Get an element based on ID
4  let element = document.getElementById("paragraphLink");
5  console.log(element.innerHTML);
6</script>

The third method is similar, it helps us locate elements with the same class name. That is getElementsByClassName(), which searches the entire document to find a collection of elements with the specified class name.

1<!--JavaScript-->
2<script>
3  // Get an element based on class name
4  let element = document.getElementByClass("text-red");
5  console.log(element.innerHTML);
6</script>

The last method is the combination of all of them, which is why it is the most commonly used method when we are trying to locate an element in HTML, it is the querySelector().

1document.querySelector("div"); // Matches a tag
2document.querySelector("#myID"); // Matches an ID
3document.querySelector(".myclass"); // Matches a class

Adding and deleting elements

Next, it's time to talk about how to manipulate these HTML elements once we've located them. In fact, almost everything in the DOM structure can be changed.

For instance, we can remove an element like this:

1// Get an element based on ID, and then remove it from the page
2let element = document.getElementById("paragraphLink");
3element.remove();

Or we can create a new element, and add it to the DOM structure:

1// Create new paragraph element
2let new_p = document.createElement("p");
3
4// Create content for the new <p> element
5let new_text = document.createTextNode("This is a new paragraph.");
6
7// Append the content to the <p> element node
8new_p.appendChild(new_text);
9
10// Add the new paragraph to the DOM structure
11let element = document.getElementById("paragraphLink");
12element.append(new_p);

As we mentioned before, a paragraph element should have a <p> element node, followed by a text node representing its content.

We can also replace one element with another:

1// Replace a paragraph with the new paragraph
2let element = document.getElementById("paragraph_link");
3element.replaceWith(new_p);

In this SECTION, we briefly talked about how to locate and manipulate HTML elements using JavaScript. However, you may have noticed that all the changes are made instantly when we refresh our browser, which is not very interactive. In the next section, we are going to discuss what other events we can use to trigger JavaScript to perform an action.

Event handlers

In computer programming, an event is a user input, such as mouse and keyboard actions, and the program is usually expected to respond with something. This process is called event handling. Let's first take a look at a very simple example. We have an HTML document with a paragraph, and we want the page to return a message when it is clicked.

1<p>Click this document to activate the handler.</p>
2<script>
3  // Recall that the () => {} syntax is how we define an arrow function in JavaScript
4  window.addEventListener("click", () => {
5    console.log("You knocked?");
6  });
7</script>

This time, the output message will only appear in the console when you click on the document, instead of the moment the page is loaded.

Registering event handlers

The addEventListener() method is how we can register an event handler for the document node. In fact, we can use the same method to register event handlers for any node in the HTML document. For example:

1<!--This time we register an event handler for the button but not the paragraph-->
2<button>Click me</button>
3<p>No handler here.</p>
4
5<script>
6  let button = document.querySelector("button");
7  button.addEventListener("click", () => {
8    console.log("Button clicked.");
9  });
10</script>

Actually, there is an onclick attribute for the HTML nodes which will have the exact same effect. However, you can only register one handler for each node that way. By using the addEventListener() method, we are able to register multiple handlers for each node.

1<button>Click me</button>
2
3<script>
4  let button = document.querySelector("button");
5
6  // When you click the button, the console outputs "Button clicked."
7  button.addEventListener("click", () => {
8    console.log("Button clicked.");
9  });
10
11  // When you click the button, the console outputs "Button double clicked."
12  button.addEventListener("dblclick", () => {
13    console.log("Button double clicked.");
14  });
15</script>

The removeEventListener() method, call with similar arguments can be used to remove an already registered event handler.

1<button>Act-once button</button>
2<script>
3  let button = document.querySelector("button");
4  function once() {
5    console.log("Done.");
6    button.removeEventListener("click", once);
7  }
8  button.addEventListener("click", once);
9</script>

This button will only work once, after the removeEventListener("click", once) method is executed, the event handler registered for the button will be removed. The function that is passed to the removeEventListener has to be the same one that you passed to the addEventListener method.

Propagation

For most event types, the event handler registered for the node with children can receive events that happened in the children. For example, if a button inside a paragraph is clicked, the event handler registered for the paragraph will also be able to see that click event.

The event is said to propagate outward. For example, if both the button and the paragraph have an event handler, then the handler registered for the button will go first, then the paragraph, and it will keep propagating outward until it reaches the root of the document.

This feature can be quite useful sometimes, however, it is not always what we want. Luckily, we can stop the propagation using the stopPropagation() method.

1<!--<button> is the child of <p>-->
2<p>A paragraph with a <button>button</button>.</p>
3<script>
4  let para = document.querySelector("p");
5  let button = document.querySelector("button");
6  para.addEventListener("mousedown", () => {
7    console.log("Handler for paragraph.");
8  });
9  button.addEventListener("mousedown", (event) => {
10    console.log("Handler for button.");
11    // If the button is clicked with the right mouse button, there will be no propagation
12    if (event.button == 2) event.stopPropagation();
13  });
14</script>

Sometimes we want to register event handlers for multiple elements on the page. To do this we can use the target attribute to cast a wide net for a type of event.

1<button>A</button>
2<button>B</button>
3<button>C</button>
4<script>
5  document.body.addEventListener("click", (event) => {
6    if (event.target.nodeName == "BUTTON") {
7      console.log("Clicked", event.target.textContent);
8    }
9  });
10</script>

Default actions

A lot of the events have a default action, for example, when you click on a link, you will be taken to the link's target, if you press the down arrow, the browser will scroll the page down. You can prevent that default action from being activated by using the preventDefault() method. Let's try something completely useless but very interesting.

1<a href="https://developer.mozilla.org/">MDN</a>
2<script>
3  let link = document.querySelector("a");
4  // When you click the link, instead of going to the URL that link specifies, the console will just output "Nope."
5  link.addEventListener("click", (event) => {
6    console.log("Nope.");
7    event.preventDefault();
8  });
9</script>

Even though this is possible, don't do this unless you have a very good reason to, or it will be very confusing for the users.

Different types of events

Now we have discussed how event handlers work in general, it's time to take a closer look at all the different types of events.

Key events

The first one we are going to talk about is the key event.

When a key on your keyboard is pressed, it will trigger a keydown event, and when it is released, it triggers a keyup event.

1<p>This page turns violet when you hold the V key.</p>
2<script>
3  window.addEventListener("keydown", (event) => {
4    if (event.key == "v") {
5      document.body.style.background = "violet";
6    }
7  });
8  window.addEventListener("keyup", (event) => {
9    if (event.key == "v") {
10      document.body.style.background = "";
11    }
12  });
13</script>

Looks very simple, however, you do need to be very careful about the keydown event. It is not a one-time thing, instead, it will keep being triggered over and over again, for as long as the key is being pressed, until it is released. You can experiment with the previous code, and see what happens when you keep the key pressed.

There are also some special keys like CTRL, ALT, and SHIFT. These are called modifier keys, they modify the original value of other keys by forming a key combination. For instance, when you press a key while holding the SHIFT key, "s" will become "S", "1" will become "!" etc. We can register event handlers for key combinations like this:

1<p>Press Control-Space to continue.</p>
2<script>
3  window.addEventListener("keydown", (event) => {
4    if (event.key == " " && event.ctrlKey) {
5      console.log("Continuing!");
6    }
7  });
8</script>

Pointer events

Pointer, as the name suggests, is used to point at things on the screen. There are primarily two ways that you can use to do that, either with a mouse or a touch screen, and they produce different types of events.

Mouse clicks

Mouse clicks work similarly to key events. When you press a mouse button, a mousedown event is triggered, and when you release that button, a mouseup event is triggered. And after the mouseup event, a complete click is finished, so a click event will be fired.

1<button>Click me!</button>
2
3<script>
4  let button = document.querySelector("button");
5
6  button.addEventListener("mousedown", (event) => {
7    console.log("mouse down");
8  });
9  button.addEventListener("mouseup", (event) => {
10    console.log("mouse up");
11  });
12  button.addEventListener("click", (event) => {
13    console.log("button clicked");
14  });
15</script>

When two clicks happen very close together, a dblclick (double click) event will be triggered after the second click.

1<button>Double click me!</button>
2
3<script>
4  let button = document.querySelector("button");
5  button.addEventListener("dblclick", (event) => {
6    console.log("double clicked");
7  });
8</script>

Mouse motion

When a mouse pointer moves, a mousemove event is triggered.

1<p>Move the cursor onto this paragraph to turn it red.</p>
2
3<script>
4  let para = document.querySelector("p");
5  para.addEventListener("mousemove", (event) => {
6    para.style.color = "red";
7  });
8</script>

This can be very useful when you are trying to implement some sort of drag and drop functionality. But to do that, we need to first track the location of the cursor. To get that information, we can either use the event's clientX and clientY properties, which contain the event’s coordinates (in pixels) relative to the top-left corner of the window, or pageX and pageY, which are relative to the top-left corner of the whole document.

For example, the following script will output the coordinates of the click events that happened on the page.

1<p>click anywhere</p>
2
3<script>
4  window.addEventListener("click", (event) => {
5    console.log("X: " + event.clientX);
6    console.log("Y: " + event.clientY);
7  });
8</script>

Here is a more complicated example, this program will display a bar, and you can drag it to change its width.

1<p>Drag the bar to change its width:</p>
2<div style="background: orange; width: 60px; height: 20px"></div>
3<script>
4  let lastX; // Tracks the last observed mouse X position
5  let bar = document.querySelector("div");
6  bar.addEventListener("mousedown", (event) => {
7    if (event.button == 0) {
8      // if the left button is being held
9      lastX = event.clientX;
10      // If the cursor moves while the left button is being held
11      window.addEventListener("mousemove", moved);
12      event.preventDefault(); // Prevent selection
13    }
14  });
15
16  function moved(event) {
17    // If no button is being held, remove the "mousemove" event handler
18    if (event.buttons == 0) {
19      // Notice this is "buttons" not "button"
20      window.removeEventListener("mousemove", moved);
21    } else {
22      let dist = event.clientX - lastX;
23      let newWidth = Math.max(10, bar.offsetWidth + dist);
24      bar.style.width = newWidth + "px";
25      lastX = event.clientX;
26    }
27  }
28</script>

Notice that we used two different ways to access which button is pushed (The button property and the buttons property), and they clearly work differently. Their main difference is that the button property can only tell you which button (singular) is clicked, while the buttons property can tell you if a combination of buttons is pushed.

The button property:

• 0: Primary button pressed, usually the left button or the un-initialized state
• 1: Auxiliary button pressed, usually the wheel button or the middle button (if present)
• 2: Secondary button pressed, usually the right button
• 3: Fourth button, typically the Browser Back button
• 4: Fifth button, typically the Browser Forward button

The buttons property:

• 0: No button or un-initialized
• 1: Primary button (usually the left button)
• 2: Secondary button (usually the right button)
• 4: Auxiliary button (usually the mouse wheel button or middle button)
• 8: 4th button (typically the "Browser Back" button)
• 16 : 5th button (typically the "Browser Forward" button)

The buttons property is able to record button combinations. When more than one button is pressed simultaneously, the values are combined. For example, when the primary and secondary buttons are pressed at the same time, the value will be 3.

Touch events

In most cases, the mouse events will also work when the user is using a touch screen. For example, when you are tapping a button on your screen, it will trigger a click event, it will be the same as clicking it with a mouse pointer.

However, this won't work in some cases, such as the resizing bar example we talked about before. Because the touch screen doesn't have multiple buttons, and it can't track your finger's position when you are not touching the screen. So to solve this problem, we have a few specific event types triggered only by touch interaction.

When your finger touches the screen, it triggers a touchstart event, when it moves while touching, it triggers a touchmove event, and finally, when you lift your finger, it triggers a touchend event.

Scroll events

A scroll event is triggered when you place the cursor on an element and scroll the middle button of your mouse. This can be very useful when you are trying to make your webpage more responsive. For example, when you go to the product showcasing page on Apple's website, notice that the elements on the page will move as you scroll down.

Here is an example of a progress bar, it starts at 0% and will go to 100% as you scroll down.

1<style>
2  #progress {
3    border-bottom: 20px solid orange;
4    width: 0;
5    position: fixed;
6    top: 0;
7    left: 0;
8  }
9</style>
10<div id="progress"></div>
11<script>
12  // Create some content
13  document.body.appendChild(
14    document.createTextNode("supercalifragilisticexpialidocious ".repeat(1000))
15  );
16
17  let bar = document.querySelector("#progress");
18  window.addEventListener("scroll", () => {
19    let max = document.body.scrollHeight - innerHeight;
20    bar.style.width = `${(pageYOffset / max) * 100}%`;
21  });
22</script>

Focus events

When an element gains focus, a focus event will be triggered, and when the element loses focus, a blur event will be triggered. Unlike the other event types we've discussed, these two do not propagate.

This is most commonly used on HTML field elements. When you click on a text field and start typing some texts, that field is said to be in focus, and when you move on from that field and click on other elements, that field element loses focus.

This is an example that displays help texts for the text field that is currently in focus.

1<p>Name: <input type="text" data-help="Your full name" /></p>
2<p>Age: <input type="text" data-help="Your age in years" /></p>
3<p id="help"></p>
4
5<script>
6  let help = document.querySelector("#help");
7  let fields = document.querySelectorAll("input");
8  for (let field of Array.from(fields)) {
9    field.addEventListener("focus", (event) => {
10      let text = event.target.getAttribute("data-help");
11      help.textContent = text;
12    });
13    field.addEventListener("blur", (event) => {
14      help.textContent = "";
15    });
16  }
17</script>

Load events

The load event is triggered when the entire page finishes loading. This is different from directly putting the code inside the <script> tag directly without event handlers. The code inside the <script> tag is run immediately when the tag is encountered. This might be too soon in some cases.

There is also a similar event type called beforeunload. It is triggered when you close a page, the primary use of this event is to prevent the user from accidentally closing their unsaved work.

Regular expression

Regular expression is technically not a part of JavaScript, it's a separate language that is built into JavaScript as well as other programming languages. Regular expression has a very awkward and cryptic syntax, but it is also very useful. It is widely used among programmers as a tool to describe, match and replace patterns in string data.

Creating a regular expression

A regular expression is an object. There are two ways you can create a regular expression in JavaScript. You can either use a RegExp() constructor or you can enclose the pattern inside a pair of forward-slash (/) characters.

1let re1 = new RegExp("abc");
2let re2 = /abc/;

Both of these examples describe the same pattern: a character a followed by a b followed by a c. The second notation, however, treats backslash (\) characters differently. For example, since the forward-slash denotes the pattern, if you want a forward-slash to be a part of the pattern, you need to put a backslash in front of it (\/).

Matching patterns

Regular expression offers a handful of methods for us to use, the most commonly used one should be the test() method, which is used for matching patterns in string data.

1console.log(/abc/.test("abcde")); // → true
2console.log(/abc/.test("abxde")); // → false

In this example, the test() method will examine the string that is passed to it, and return a boolean value telling you if a pattern match is found.

However, simply testing if the pattern "abc" is found in a string does not seem very useful. Sometimes we want to test for a match using a set of characters. For example, the following code test if at least one of the characters, from character 0 to character 9, exists in the string "in 1992".

1console.log(/[0123456789]/.test("in 1992")); // → true
2
3// A hyphen character can be used to indicate a range of characters
4console.log(/[0-9]/.test("in 1992")); // → true

It is also possible to match any character that is not in the set. For example, this time we'll match any character that is not 1 or 0.

1let notBinary = /[^01]/;
2console.log(notBinary.test("1100100010100110")); // → false
3
4// The string contains a character "2" which is not in the set [01]
5console.log(notBinary.test("1100100010200110")); // → true

Some of the commonly used character sets have shortcuts in regular expressions. For instance, \d represents all digit characters, same as [0-9].

• \d Any digit character
• \w Any alphanumeric character (word character)
• \s Any whitespace character (space, tab, new line ...)
• \D Any non-digit character
• \W Any non-alphanumeric character
• \S Any non-whitespace character
• . Any character except for the new line

Now, we could match a date-time format (10-07-2021 16:06) like this, and as you see, it is awkward and cryptic as advertised.

1let dateTime = /\d\d-\d\d-\d\d\d\d \d\d:\d\d/;
2console.log(dateTime.test("10-07-2021 16:06")); // → true

Matching repeating patterns

You may have noticed that in our previous example, each \d only matches one digit character. What if we want to match a sequence of digits of arbitrary length? We can do that by putting a plus mark (+) after the element we wish to repeat.

1console.log(/\d+/.test("123")); // → true
2console.log(/\d+/.test("")); // → false

The star sign has a similar meaning except it allows the element to match for zero times.

1console.log(/\d*/.test("123")); // → true
2console.log(/\d*/.test("")); // → true

We can also indicate precisely how many times we want the element to repeat. For example, if we put {4} after an element, that means this element will be repeated four times. If we put {2,4} after that element, it means the element will be repeated at least twice and at most four times.

1console.log(/\d{3}/.test("123")); // → true
2console.log(/\d{3}/.test("12")); // → false

It is possible to repeat a group of elements as well. We only need to enclose that group of elements inside a pair of parentheses.

1let cartoonCrying = /boo+(hoo+)+/i;
2console.log(cartoonCrying.test("Boohoooohoohooo")); // → true

In some cases, we need a part of the pattern to be optional. For example, the word "neighbour" can also be spelled "neighbor", which means the character "u" should be optional. Here is what we can do:

1let neighbor = /neighbou?r/;
2console.log(neighbor.test("neighbour"));
3// → true
4console.log(neighbor.test("neighbor"));
5// → true

Other methods for matching patterns

The test() method is the simplest way of finding out if a pattern match is found in a string. However, it doesn't give you much information besides returning a boolean value telling you if a match is found. The regular expression also has an exec() method (exec stands for execute) that would return an object giving you more information, such as what the match is and where it is found.

1let match = /\d+/.exec("one two 100");
2console.log(match); // → ["100"]
3
4// The index property tells you where in the string the match begins
5console.log(match.index); // → 8

There is also a match() method that belongs to the string type, which behaves similarly.

1console.log("one two 100".match(/\d+/)); // → ["100"]