Query-string encoding of a Javascript Object

Question

Do you know a fast and simple way to encode a Javascript Object into a string that I can pass via a GET Request?

No jQuery, no

Answer 1

Do you need to send arbitrary objects? If so, GET is a bad idea since there are limits to the lengths of URLs that user agents and web servers will accepts. My suggestion would be to build up an array of name-value pairs to send and then build up a query string:

function QueryStringBuilder() {
    var nameValues = [];

    this.add = function(name, value) {
        nameValues.push( {name: name, value: value} );
    };

    this.toQueryString = function() {
        var segments = [], nameValue;
        for (var i = 0, len = nameValues.length; i < len; i++) {
            nameValue = nameValues[i];
            segments[i] = encodeURIComponent(nameValue.name) + "=" + encodeURIComponent(nameValue.value);
        }
        return segments.join("&");
    };
}

var qsb = new QueryStringBuilder();
qsb.add("veg", "cabbage");
qsb.add("vegCount", "5");

alert( qsb.toQueryString() );