JavaScript equivalent of jQuery's extend method

Question

Background

I have a function that takes a config object as an argument. Within the function, I also have default object. Each of those

Answer 1

You can loop through Object's properties using for statement.

var settings = extend(default, config);

function extend(a, b){
    var c = {};
    for(var p in a)
        c[p] = (b[p] == null) ? a[p] : b[p];
    return c;
}

Answer 2

You can use Object.assign.

var defaults = {key1: "default1", key2: "default2", key3: "defaults3"};
var config = {key1: "value1"};

var settings = Object.assign({}, defaults, config); // values in config override values in defaults
console.log(settings); // Object {key1: "value1", key2: "default2", key3: "defaults3"}

It copies the values of all enumerable own properties from one or more source objects to a target object and returns the target object.

Object.assign(target, ...sources)

It works in all desktop browsers except IE (but including Edge). It has mitigated mobile support.

See for yourself here: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Object/assign

About deep copy

However, Object.assign does not have the deep option that jQuery's extend method have.

Note: you can generally use JSON for a similar effect though

var config = {key1: "value1"};
    var defaults = {key1: "default1", key2: "default2", keyDeep: {
        kd1: "default3",
        kd2: "default4"
    }};
    var settings = JSON.parse(JSON.stringify(Object.assign({}, defaults, config))); 
    console.log(settings.keyDeep); // Object {kd1: "default3", kd2: "default4"}

Answer 3

This is my slightly different approach with deep copy I came up with while trying to eliminate a jQuery dependency. It is mostly designed for being small so it might have not all feature one expects. Should be fully ES5-compatible (starting from IE9 due to usage of Object.keys):

function extend(obj1, obj2) {
    var keys = Object.keys(obj2);
    for (var i = 0; i < keys.length; i += 1) {
      var val = obj2[keys[i]];
      obj1[keys[i]] = ['string', 'number', 'array', 'boolean'].indexOf(typeof val) === -1 ? extend(obj1[keys[i]] || {}, val) : val;
    }
    return obj1;
  }

You may wonder what the fifth line does exactly do ... If obj2.key is an object literal (i.e. if it's no ordinary type) we recursively call extend on it. If a property with that name doesn't exist in obj1 yet, we initialize it to an empty object first. Otherwise we simply set obj1.key to obj2.key.

Here are some of my mocha/chai tests that should prove the common cases to work here:

it('should extend a given flat object with another flat object', () => {
  const obj1 = {
    prop1: 'val1',
    prop2: 42,
    prop3: true,
    prop4: 20.16,
  };
  const obj2 = {
    prop4: 77.123,
    propNew1: 'newVal1',
    propNew2: 71,
  };
  assert.deepEqual(utils.extend(obj1, obj2), {
    prop1: 'val1',
    prop2: 42,
    prop3: true,
    prop4: 77.123,
    propNew1: 'newVal1',
    propNew2: 71,
  });
});

it('should deep-extend a given flat object with a nested object', () => {
  const obj1 = {
    prop1: 'val1',
    prop2: 'val2',
  };
  const obj2 = {
    propNew1: 'newVal1',
    propNew2: {
      propNewDeep1: 'newDeepVal1',
      propNewDeep2: 42,
      propNewDeep3: true,
      propNewDeep4: 20.16,
    },
  };
  assert.deepEqual(utils.extend(obj1, obj2), {
    prop1: 'val1',
    prop2: 'val2',
    propNew1: 'newVal1',
    propNew2: {
      propNewDeep1: 'newDeepVal1',
      propNewDeep2: 42,
      propNewDeep3: true,
      propNewDeep4: 20.16,
    },
  });
});

it('should deep-extend a given nested object with another nested object and deep-overwrite members', () => {
  const obj1 = {
    prop1: 'val1',
    prop2: {
      propDeep1: 'deepVal1',
      propDeep2: 42,
      propDeep3: true,
      propDeep4: {
        propDeeper1: 'deeperVal1',
        propDeeper2: 777,
        propDeeper3: 'I will survive',
      },
    },
    prop3: 'lone survivor',
  };
  const obj2 = {
    prop1: 'newVal1',
    prop2: {
      propDeep1: 'newDeepVal1',
      propDeep2: 84,
      propDeep3: false,
      propDeep4: {
        propDeeper1: 'newDeeperVal1',
        propDeeper2: 888,
      },
    },
  };
  assert.deepEqual(utils.extend(obj1, obj2), {
    prop1: 'newVal1',
    prop2: {
      propDeep1: 'newDeepVal1',
      propDeep2: 84,
      propDeep3: false,
      propDeep4: {
        propDeeper1: 'newDeeperVal1',
        propDeeper2: 888,
        propDeeper3: 'I will survive',
      },
    },
    prop3: 'lone survivor',
  });
});

I'd be happy about feedback or comments on this implementation. Thanks in advance!

Answer 4

The approach of Ivan Kuckir's can also be adapted to create a new object prototype:

Object.prototype.extend = function(b){
for(var key in b)
    if(b.hasOwnProperty(key))
        this[key] = b[key];
    return this;
}

var settings = default.extend(config);

Answer 5

You can use the ECMA 2018 spread operator in object literals...

var config = {key1: value1};
var default = {key1: default1, key2: default2, key 3: default 3};

var settings = {...default, ...config}

//resulting properties of settings:
settings = {key1: value1, key2: default2, key 3: default 3};

BabelJS support for older browsers

Answer 6

I prefer this code that uses my generic forEachIn, and does not mangle the first object:

function forEachIn(obj, fn) {
    var index = 0;
    for (var key in obj) {
        if (obj.hasOwnProperty(key)) {
            fn(obj[key], key, index++);
        }
    }
}

function extend() {
    var result = {};
    for (var i = 0; i < arguments.length; i++) {
        forEachIn(arguments[i],
            function(obj, key) {
                result[key] = obj;
            });
    }
    return result;
}

If you really do want to merge stuff into the first object, you can do:

obj1 = extend(obj1, obj2);