Develop Reference

Javascript: Calling a function in an object literal

I'm learning to program in Javascript and I'd like some help/clarification.
I declared an array that contains animal names. I defined a function that I use to split a string in two. Then I create an empty object literal and add an animal and corresponding breed. I'm trying to invoke the separateWords function in the object literal, but I need some clarification. Here's my code:
var myPets = ["Bengal Bobcat", "Beagle"];
var separateWords = function (string) {
return string.split(" ");
};
var nameCollection = {};
nameCollection.cat = separateWords(myPets[0]);
nameCollection.dog = myPets[1];
nameCollection.fish = null;
When I enter console.log(nameCollection) I get the following:
Object {cat: Array[2], dog: “Beagle”, fish: null}
cat: Array[2]
0: "Bengal"
1: "Bobcat"
length: 2
However, when I enter console.log( separateWords(myPets[0])), I see:
[“Bengal”, “Bobcat”]
I don’t understand why the value of cat shows up as Array[2].

The console displays it as Array[2] as it would be (potentially) unreadable if it expanded it fully. One way to see everything is to stringify it using JSON.stringify which goes through each item in the object recursively and calls toString() on it:
var myPets = ["Bengal Bobcat", "Beagle"];
var separateWords = function (string) {
return string.split(" ");
};
var nameCollection = {};
nameCollection.cat = separateWords(myPets[0]);
nameCollection.dog = myPets[1];
nameCollection.fish = null;
document.body.textContent = JSON.stringify(nameCollection);

You are assigning to cat the result of the separateWords() function call, passing myPets[0] as a parameter.
separateWords() returns an array and with the myPets[0] input it returns a new array with the "Bengal" and "Bobcat" values splitted by the whitespace.
The split() function is the one creating an array with the splitted values and this result is returned by your separateWords() function, which also is the value assigned to the cat object member.

Each browser implements its console like it wants.
So your browser decided to implement the behavior you describe.
If you don't like it, propose a better idea to the developers of this browser. Or use another browser.

I am going to assume you are using Chrome Developer Tools or Firebug.
Developer tools condenses arrays and objects into easily readable lines you then inspect further with. What I mean is, you push the little arrow next each line in the console log to further inspect each object. I will use pictures to explain this.
Here I am assigning an array and then assigning an element in an object to that array as so:
As you can see when I log the object it show's an Array[2] rather than expand the array. In this next picture I then expand the array to inspect it.
Why is this exactly? My first thought is ease of readability. If you have an app that is complex and you have numerous debugging console logs, you can see all the logs on single lines making it easier to hunt down specific logs. As well, if you have a very large and complex object, it is arguably easier to read all the root elements on each line without expanding all the objects and arrays found within that object recursively.

String.prototype.split() returns an array containing the two values in the string which have been split. Read through this.
nameCollection.cat = separateWords(myPets[0])[0]; // nameCollection.cat == Bengal
nameCollection.cat = separateWords(myPets[0])[1]; // nameCollection.cat == Bobcat

This is simply how javascript (and many other languages) work. When you try to print "nameCollection" javascript doesn't automatically do a nice job of printing the cat array. Instead, it simply prints some type related information, which in this case is saying "cat" is an array of length 2.

Assign dynamic array to object

I want to pass following payload to the API
params[field1]: value1
params[field2]: value1
....
params[fieldN]: valueN
I have field and value coming from an object.
var params = {};
jQuery.each($scope.linkParams, function(a, b) {
params.params[a] = b; // returns undefined variable error
// I also tried other options but all result in one or another error
// Some doesn't result into an erro but doesn't get merged. See below merge requirement
});
I also wants to merge the above created object to another object with
jQuery.extend(extraParams, params);
How to achieve the rquired object?
Update
$scope.linkParams = {
field1: 'value1',
field2: 'value2',
....
};

You have two questions, so I'll address them one at a time.
(For a TL;DR, I emboldened the solution text. Hopefully the rest is worth the read, though.)
Object Serialization is Pretty Magical, but Not Quite That Magical
If I had a JS object that I instantiated like the following:
var cat = {
'meow': 'loud',
'type': 'Persian',
'sex': 'male'
}
then it is certainly true that you get attribute reference for free. That is, you can say something like cat.meow, and your runtime environment will make sense of that. However, JS will not automatically create properties of an object that you have referenced do not exist, unless you are referencing them to create them.
cat.health = 'meek' will work, but cat.ears[0] = 'pointy' will not.
var cat = {
'meow': 'loud',
'type': 'Persian',
'sex': 'male'
}
cat.health = 'meek'
alert(cat.health)
cat.ears[0] = 'pointy'
alert(cat.ears[0])
<script src="https://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/2.1.1/jquery.min.js"></script>
You'll notice that the first alert happens and contains the expected value, but the second alert never comes. This is because the code fails on the line with cat.ears[0] = 'pointy', and it stops execution at that point.
This may seem to contradict what I just said, but look closely at what's happening. When we attempt to initialize the first element of cat.ears, we must reference the cat.ears property, which does not exist.
JS implementations won't assume that you want to create items up the chain eternally, which is likely by design -- if it didn't throw errors and instead just created any properties or objects that needed to exist in order for your program to by syntactically sound, many pieces of software would silently break when they failed to include required libraries. If you forgot to include JQuery, it'd just create a $, a JQuery variable, and all of the properties of those objects you reference in your code. It'd be a proper mess to debug.
In short, that's what you're -- probably accidentally -- assuming will work here. params.params is analogous to cat.ears in the above example. You may have some reason for doing this, but assuming you don't, your code should function if you simply change params.params[a] to params[a].
JQuery.extend()
Assuming that extraParams is a valid array/object, the code you have written will work once params doesn't break your code anymore, however: do note that this will modify your extraParams object. If you want a new object to contain both params and extraParams, write something more like:
var args = $.extend({}, params, extraParams)
That will modify an empty object and add in the contents of params and extraParams. See the JQuery documentation for more information.

Some manipulations and I was able to achieve the required results.
I am posting the code for further reference:
var d = {};
jQuery.each($scope.linkParams, function(a,b) {
a = "params[" + a + "]";
d[a] = b;
});
jQuery.extend(extraParams, d);

Can I make a "Virtual Array" in JavaScript?

I'm calling a JavaScript function that wants an array of things to display. It displays a count, and displays the items one by one. Everything works when I pass it a normal JavaScript array.
But I have too many items to hold in memory at once. What I'd like to do, is pass it an object with the same interface as an array, and have my method(s) be called when the function tries to access the data. And in fact, if I pass the following:
var featureArray = {length: count, 0: func(0)};
then the count is displayed, and the first item is correctly displayed. But I don't want to assign all the entries, or I'll run out of memory. And the function currently crashes when the user tries to display the second item. I want to know when item 1 is accessed, and return func(1) for item 1, and func(2) for item 2, etc. (i.e., delaying the creation of the item until it is requested).
Is this possible in JavaScript?

If I understand correctly, this would help:
var object = {length: count, data: function (whatever) {
// create your item
}};
Then, instead of doing array[1], array[2], et cetera, you'd do object.data(1), object.data(2), and so on.

Since there seems to be a constraint that the data must be accessed using array indexing via normal array indexing arr[index] and that can't be changed, then the answer is that NO, you can't override array indexing in Javascript to change how it works and make some sort of virtual array that only fetches data upon demand. It was proposed for ECMAScript 4 and rejected as a feature.
See these two other posts for other discussion/confirmation:
How would you overload the [] operator in Javascript
In javascript, can I override the brackets to access characters in a string?
The usual way to solve this problem would be to switch to using a method such as .get(n) to request the data and then the implementor of .get() can virtualize however much they want.
P.S. Others indicate that you could use a Proxy object for this in Firefox (not supported in other browsers as far as I know), but I'm not personally familiar with Proxy objects as it's use seems rather limited to code that only targets Firefox right now.

Yes, generating items on the go is possible. You will want to have a look at Lazy.js, a library for producing lazily computed/loaded sequences.
However, you will need to change your function that accepts this sequence, it will need to be consumed differently than a plain array.
If you really need to fake an array interface, you'd use Proxies. Unfortunately, it is only a harmony draft and currently only supported in Firefox' Javascript 1.8.5.
Assuming that the array is only accessed in an iteration, i.e. starting with index 0, you might be able to do some crazy things with getters:
var featureArray = (function(func) {
var arr = {length: 0};
function makeGetter(i) {
arr.length = i+1;
Object.defineProperty(arr, i, {
get: function() {
var val = func(i);
Object.defineProperty(arr, i, {value:val});
makeGetter(i+1);
return val;
},
configurable: true,
enumerable: true
});
}
makeGetter(0);
return arr;
}(func));
However, I'd recommend to avoid that and rather switch the library that is expecting the array. This solution is very errorprone if anything else is done with the "array" but accessing its indices in order.

Thank you to everyone who has commented and answered my original question - it seems that this is not (currently) supported by JavaScript.
I was able to get around this limitation, and still do what I wanted. It uses an aspect of the program that I did not mention in my original question (I was trying to simplify the question), so it is understandable that other's couldn't recommend this. That is, it doesn't technically answer my original question, but I'm sharing it in case others find it useful.
It turns out that one member of the object in each array element is a callback function. That is (using the terminology from my original question), func(n) is returning an object, which contains a function in one member, which is called by the method being passed the data. Since this callback function knows the index it is associated with (at least, when being created by func(n)), it can add the next item in the array (or at least ensure that it is already there) when it is called. A more complicated solution might go a few ahead, and/or behind, and/or could cleanup items not near the current index to free memory. This all assumes that the items will be accessed consecutively (which is the case in my program).
E.g.,
1) Create a variable that will stay in scope (e.g., a global variable).
2) Call the function with an object like I gave as an example in my original question:
var featureArray = {length: count, 0: func(0)};
3) func() can be something like:
function func(r) {
return {
f : function() {featureArray[r + 1] = func(r + 1); DoOtherStuff(r); }
}
}
Assuming that f() is the member with the function that will be called by the external function.

Javascript pushing objects into array changes entire array

I'm using a specific game making framework but I think the question applies to javascript
I was trying to make a narration script so the player can see "The orc hits you." at the bottom of his screen. I wanted to show the last 4 messages at one time and possibly allow the player to look back to see 30-50 messages in a log if they want. To do this I set up and object and an array to push the objects into.
So I set up some variables like this initially...
servermessage: {"color1":"yellow", "color2":"white", "message1":"", "message2":""},
servermessagelist: new Array(),
and when I use this command (below) multiple times with different data called by an event by manipulating servermessage.color1 ... .message1 etc...
servermessagelist.push(servermessage)
it overwrites the entire array with copies of that data... any idea why or what I can do about it.
So if I push color1 "RED" and message1 "Rover".. the data is correct then if I push
color1"yellow" and message1 "Bus" the data is two copies of .color1:"yellow" .message1:"Bus"

When you push servermessage into servermessagelist you're really (more or less) pushing a reference to that object. So any changes made to servermessage are reflected everywhere you have a reference to it. It sounds like what you want to do is push a clone of the object into the list.
Declare a function as follows:
function cloneMessage(servermessage) {
var clone ={};
for( var key in servermessage ){
if(servermessage.hasOwnProperty(key)) //ensure not adding inherited props
clone[key]=servermessage[key];
}
return clone;
}
Then everytime you want to push a message into the list do:
servermessagelist.push( cloneMessage(servermessage) );

When you add the object to the array, it's only a reference to the object that is added. The object is not copied by adding it to the array. So, when you later change the object and add it to the array again, you just have an array with several references to the same object.
Create a new object for each addition to the array:
servermessage = {"color1":"yellow", "color2":"white", "message1":"", "message2":""};
servermessagelist.push(servermessage);
servermessage = {"color1":"green", "color2":"red", "message1":"", "message2":"nice work"};
servermessagelist.push(servermessage);

There are two ways to use deep copy the object before pushing it into the array.
1. create new object by object method and then push it.
servermessagelist = [];
servermessagelist.push(Object.assign({}, servermessage));
Create an new reference of object by JSON stringigy method and push it with parse method.
servermessagelist = [];
servermessagelist.push(JSON.parse(JSON.stringify(servermessage));
This method is useful for nested objects.

servermessagelist: new Array() empties the array every time it's executed. Only execute that code once when you originally initialize the array.

I also had same issue. I had bit complex object that I was pushing in to the array. What I did; I Convert JSON object as String using JSON.stringify() and push in to the Array.
When it is returning from the array I just convert that String to JSON object using JSON.parse().
This is working fine for me though it is bit far more round solution.
Post here If you guys having alternative options

I do not know why a JSON way of doing this has not been suggested yet.
You can first stringify the object and then parse it again to get a copy of the object.
let uniqueArr = [];
let referencesArr = [];
let obj = {a: 1, b:2};
uniqueArr.push(JSON.parse(JSON.stringify(obj)));
referencesArr.push(obj);
obj.a = 3;
obj.c = 5;
uniqueArr.push(JSON.parse(JSON.stringify(obj)));
referencesArr.push(obj);
//You can see the differences in the console logs
console.log(uniqueArr);
console.log(referencesArr);

This solution also work on the object containing nested keys.
Before pushing, stringify the obj by
JSON.stringify(obj)
And when you are using, parse by
JSON.parse(obj);

As mentioned multiple times above, the easiest way of doing this would be making it a string and converting it back to JSON Object.
this.<JSONObjectArray>.push(JSON.parse(JSON.stringify(<JSONObject>)));
Works like a charm.

How to merge few 3D JSON objects in JS [or jQuery]

I have to merge 2 (up to 6) JSON objects.
I got this code: http://jsfiddle.net/5Uz27/
But with this code, I can only merge the first level of the objects, so the deeper levels are usually overwritten. Check the output.
How can I fix that?

jQuery.extend(true, original_object, extend_with);
source: http://api.jquery.com/jQuery.extend/

With jQuery, you can use $.extend() to do a "deep"/recursive merge of objects, by passing in true as the first argument.
Here's how this might work in your example:
// turn the strings into objects
var pref_array = $.map(json_holder, JSON.parse);
// add the deep=true argument
pref_array.unshift(true);
// now do a deep extend, passing the array as arguments
var prefs = $.extend.apply(null, pref_array );
This might be a little obtuse (you could make it even more so, but tighter, by setting pref_array to [true].concat($.map(json_holder, JSON.parse))), but it avoids the ungainly for loop (that might be personal preference, I suppose).
Working jsFiddle here: http://jsfiddle.net/e6bnU/