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Every time console.log is executed, a line saying undefined is appended to the output log.
It happens in both Firefox and Chrome on Windows and Linux.
If you're running console.log() from a JS file, this undefined line should not be appended.
If you're running console.log() from the console itself, it makes sense. This is why: In the console you can type a name of a variable (for example try typing window) and it prints info about it. When you run any void function (like console.log) from the console, it also prints out info about the return value, undefined in this case.
I tested both cases on my Chrome (Mac ver 23.0.1271.101) and indeed I see the undefined line when I run it inside the console. This undefined also appears when I write this line in the console: var bla = "sdfdfs"
Although talkol´s answer is ok, I try to put it more straight:
JavaScript is designed as a dynamic language which means that the type (string, void, boolean …) of a function return value is not pre-defined. If a function does not use a return statement or an empty return statement with no value, JavaScript automatically returns undefined. That means that in JavaScript every function returns something, at least undefined.
So the function console.log() in Chrome console either uses no or an empty return statement, so that the return value of this function is undefined. This function return value gets also displayed in the Chrome console.
[If somebody know where to find the definition of the console.log() function in Google Chrome source code, please comment with the link, then we can even go further and look at the real code, would be nice.]
Sources:
https://stackoverflow.com/a/20915524/1744768
https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/A_re-introduction_to_JavaScript
Follow the picture to solve this problem:
Ctrl + Shift + J
Console environment in your browser is designed to take the very last statement expression in a program and evaluate it for a value and then show you that value.
The result of an assignment expression is the value that was assigned.
So the JavaScript engine just does an assignment but the console does one extra step which is to set whatever my last statement is, give you that value back. That’s why it prints 2:
In statements that have no return value you get something like undefined.
undefined is the return value of the console.log() in Chrome developer tools. You will get undefined if you do the following in Chrome developer tools, and you will see that you get undefined even though x has the value 3.
> let x = 3
> undefined
What you can do is simply create your own console.log like function with a return to change this behavior when doing a lot of coding in the developer console. Here is an example of what that looks like in the developer console:
console.log('I hate seeing the next line stating the obvious.')
I hate seeing the next line stating the obvious.
undefined
log = function(l){return l}
function log()
if(1 === 2){console.log('1 is not equal to 2.')}else{log('No Shit Sherlock.')}
"No Shit Sherlock."
That undefined you see in console is the return value of the function:
check out these two variants:
This one returns nothing
This one returns something:
Remember one thing. Any function that has some definition will always return something, If you skip the return keyword, it will eventually return undefined when you call it.
If you're using console.log to emit multiple values in a single line, here's a hacky alternative:
var1 + ' ' + var2 + ' ' + var...
(Better ideas welcome, this might blow up in certain circumstances)
Every time console.log is executed, a line saying undefined is appended to the output log.
It happens in both Firefox and Chrome on Windows and Linux.
If you're running console.log() from a JS file, this undefined line should not be appended.
If you're running console.log() from the console itself, it makes sense. This is why: In the console you can type a name of a variable (for example try typing window) and it prints info about it. When you run any void function (like console.log) from the console, it also prints out info about the return value, undefined in this case.
I tested both cases on my Chrome (Mac ver 23.0.1271.101) and indeed I see the undefined line when I run it inside the console. This undefined also appears when I write this line in the console: var bla = "sdfdfs"
Although talkol´s answer is ok, I try to put it more straight:
JavaScript is designed as a dynamic language which means that the type (string, void, boolean …) of a function return value is not pre-defined. If a function does not use a return statement or an empty return statement with no value, JavaScript automatically returns undefined. That means that in JavaScript every function returns something, at least undefined.
So the function console.log() in Chrome console either uses no or an empty return statement, so that the return value of this function is undefined. This function return value gets also displayed in the Chrome console.
[If somebody know where to find the definition of the console.log() function in Google Chrome source code, please comment with the link, then we can even go further and look at the real code, would be nice.]
Sources:
https://stackoverflow.com/a/20915524/1744768
https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/A_re-introduction_to_JavaScript
Follow the picture to solve this problem:
Ctrl + Shift + J
Console environment in your browser is designed to take the very last statement expression in a program and evaluate it for a value and then show you that value.
The result of an assignment expression is the value that was assigned.
So the JavaScript engine just does an assignment but the console does one extra step which is to set whatever my last statement is, give you that value back. That’s why it prints 2:
In statements that have no return value you get something like undefined.
undefined is the return value of the console.log() in Chrome developer tools. You will get undefined if you do the following in Chrome developer tools, and you will see that you get undefined even though x has the value 3.
> let x = 3
> undefined
What you can do is simply create your own console.log like function with a return to change this behavior when doing a lot of coding in the developer console. Here is an example of what that looks like in the developer console:
console.log('I hate seeing the next line stating the obvious.')
I hate seeing the next line stating the obvious.
undefined
log = function(l){return l}
function log()
if(1 === 2){console.log('1 is not equal to 2.')}else{log('No Shit Sherlock.')}
"No Shit Sherlock."
That undefined you see in console is the return value of the function:
check out these two variants:
This one returns nothing
This one returns something:
Remember one thing. Any function that has some definition will always return something, If you skip the return keyword, it will eventually return undefined when you call it.
If you're using console.log to emit multiple values in a single line, here's a hacky alternative:
var1 + ' ' + var2 + ' ' + var...
(Better ideas welcome, this might blow up in certain circumstances)
Every time console.log is executed, a line saying undefined is appended to the output log.
It happens in both Firefox and Chrome on Windows and Linux.
If you're running console.log() from a JS file, this undefined line should not be appended.
If you're running console.log() from the console itself, it makes sense. This is why: In the console you can type a name of a variable (for example try typing window) and it prints info about it. When you run any void function (like console.log) from the console, it also prints out info about the return value, undefined in this case.
I tested both cases on my Chrome (Mac ver 23.0.1271.101) and indeed I see the undefined line when I run it inside the console. This undefined also appears when I write this line in the console: var bla = "sdfdfs"
Although talkol´s answer is ok, I try to put it more straight:
JavaScript is designed as a dynamic language which means that the type (string, void, boolean …) of a function return value is not pre-defined. If a function does not use a return statement or an empty return statement with no value, JavaScript automatically returns undefined. That means that in JavaScript every function returns something, at least undefined.
So the function console.log() in Chrome console either uses no or an empty return statement, so that the return value of this function is undefined. This function return value gets also displayed in the Chrome console.
[If somebody know where to find the definition of the console.log() function in Google Chrome source code, please comment with the link, then we can even go further and look at the real code, would be nice.]
Sources:
https://stackoverflow.com/a/20915524/1744768
https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/A_re-introduction_to_JavaScript
Follow the picture to solve this problem:
Ctrl + Shift + J
Console environment in your browser is designed to take the very last statement expression in a program and evaluate it for a value and then show you that value.
The result of an assignment expression is the value that was assigned.
So the JavaScript engine just does an assignment but the console does one extra step which is to set whatever my last statement is, give you that value back. That’s why it prints 2:
In statements that have no return value you get something like undefined.
undefined is the return value of the console.log() in Chrome developer tools. You will get undefined if you do the following in Chrome developer tools, and you will see that you get undefined even though x has the value 3.
> let x = 3
> undefined
What you can do is simply create your own console.log like function with a return to change this behavior when doing a lot of coding in the developer console. Here is an example of what that looks like in the developer console:
console.log('I hate seeing the next line stating the obvious.')
I hate seeing the next line stating the obvious.
undefined
log = function(l){return l}
function log()
if(1 === 2){console.log('1 is not equal to 2.')}else{log('No Shit Sherlock.')}
"No Shit Sherlock."
That undefined you see in console is the return value of the function:
check out these two variants:
This one returns nothing
This one returns something:
Remember one thing. Any function that has some definition will always return something, If you skip the return keyword, it will eventually return undefined when you call it.
If you're using console.log to emit multiple values in a single line, here's a hacky alternative:
var1 + ' ' + var2 + ' ' + var...
(Better ideas welcome, this might blow up in certain circumstances)
How can I assign a JavaScript object to a variable which was printed using console.log?
I am in Chrome console. With Ruby I would use test = _ to access the most recent item printed.
If you want to do this to an object that has been already logged (one time thing), chrome console offers a good solution.
Hover over the printed object in the console, right click, then click on "Store as Global Variable". Chrome will assign it to a temporary var name for you which you can use in the console.
You could override standard console.log() function with your own, adding the behaviour you need:
console.oldLog = console.log;
console.log = function(value)
{
console.oldLog(value);
window.$log = value;
};
// Usage
console.log('hello');
$log // Has 'hello' in it
This way, you don't have to change your existing logging code. You could also extend it adding an array and storing the whole history of printed objects/values.
In Chrome developer tools, you may access last item by $_:
> 1+1;
2
> $_
2
Derivative of mirrormx's answer, but more convenient. I don't need to write a function and can just put it in anywhere on the spur of the moment.
console.log(window.$log = data);
Here is chrome reference for comand line api.
There is $_ variable but it "Returns the value of the most recently evaluated expression" not printed, you can make your own log function like this:
function log(data){
console.log(data);
return data;
}
// after that you can access last printed value by $_
Please, note that my function is for example, console.log possibilities is much more advanced
I just got the following error in a piece of javascript (in Firefox 3.5, with Firebug running)
cannot access optimized closure
I know, superficially, what caused the error. I had a line
options.length()
instead of
options.length
Fixing this bug, made the message go away. But I'm curious. What does this mean? What is an optimized closure? Is optimizing an enclosure something that the javascript interpretter does automatically? What does it do?
I had this issue too when Firebug is running.
It seems to happen sometimes, when an exception is raised (for whatever reason) and when there's a recursive function call somewhere in the call stack. The exception gets re-raised as the mysterious "InternalError: cannot access optimized closure"
Changing the way I define the recursive function, seems to make this issue go away. eg changing from
function foo(bar) {... foo(recursively); ...}
to
var foo = function(bar) {... foo(recursively); ...}
Hope that helps.
It is a bug in Firefox happening with Firebug open:
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=505001
[An earlier answer mentioned this was due to this other bug, which I think is incorrect as that other problem was not related to Firebug.]
Seems like a Firefox bug:
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=496790
A closure is a function with context. If you dynamically create a new function, then you create a closure.
function makeAdder(int num) {
return function(int num2) { return num + num2; }
}
adder = makeAdder(5);
adder(7) // returns (5+7) = 12
adder(2) // returns (5+2) = 7
Here, the closure is the inner function, as returned by makeAdder, along with the '5' that was passed.
The javascript engine might choose to optimize away the function shown above, to make things run faster, never generating or running that code, so it can't be debugged or referenced. Optimizers are supposed to be very careful to ensure there's no impact, so I'd guess this one made a mistake.
http://ludex-marketing.com/blog/2009/12/google-analytics-javascript-error-cannot-access-optimized-closure-in-ga-js/
This can also be caused by a simple race condition. I was just refactoring a 'startup' object that does a few things before the document is ready. As soon as I tried to access a second object defined immediately below the startup object I received this error.
I was under the impression that script execution waited until all of the code was compiled. Clearly that's not the case. Waiting for document ready to call methods on the second object fixed the problem. Also, using this nice 'dump()' function confirms that the second object is only partially defined when the error occurs: http://www.openjs.com/scripts/others/dump_function_php_print_r.php
I encountered the same error today. In my case this occurred because I was referencing an object's attribute or function that did not exist or was not available. I'm guessing that since the object was available via a closure that was optimized, firebug could not access metadata on that object and thus the cryptic error message.
This also happened to me today. Firebug error'd at line 2 of this function:
function IsValidDate(objName) {
re = new RegExp('^( +|today|pdate|- *\\d+ *(day(s|)|week(s|))+ *$', 'i');
if (re.test(objName.value)) return 2;
return (chkdate(objName));
}
When I added "var " before the declaration of "re" in line 1, the error went away.
There is an exception being raised somewhere else in your code within the function that has this error. It could be as simple trying to access a variable that doesn't exist.
I think we need to get a Firebug dev in here to answer why it doesn't give a more specific error as to where in the closure that raised the exception to prompt the error.
You pasted options.length(), but it is not what prompted the error. What caused the error is the fact that your bug was inside a closure.
function(){
array.length()
}
that gives the error