Convert array name to string

Question

I have a bunch of arrays, and a bunch of folders with files I'm trying to get to. The items in the arrays correspond to the file names and the array names match the folder names.

So I have

 var myArray = ['my', 'file', 'here'];
 var myArray2 = ['some', 'more', 'files'];

& similar as audio files. For example `myArray/my.mp3'

I'm trying to create a string like that dynamically. I wanted to somehow convert my array names to strings but apparently that can't be done. Any other solutions much appreciated.

You never want variable name strings in your program. Please, tell us what you are [actually trying to do](http://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/66377/what-is-the-xy-problem). — Bergi, Sep 22 '13 at 12:27
possible duplicate of [Javascript dynamic variable name](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/5117127/javascript-dynamic-variable-name) — Boaz, Sep 22 '13 at 12:28
OK I will edit the question now to be more specific to what I want to achieve. — suryanaga, Sep 22 '13 at 12:33

score 0 · Answer 1 · answered Sep 22 '13 at 12:32

Not sure I understand your question. If you want flexibility, you could use an object. Initialize it at the beginning of your life-cycle app like so:

var obj = { name: 'tmp', value: null }

Later, you could assign both a name and a value to your object based on the user action:

obj['name'] = 'chosenArray';
obj['value'] = myArrayTwo;

Hope this helps,

R.

6502 · Answer 2 · 2013-09-22T12:49:07.853

You technically CAN access a variable using a string containing its name:

var array1 = [1,2,3,4];
var array2 = [5,6,7,8];

var pick = "array2";

var chosen = window[pick];

and you can also create a global variable that way

var newvarname = "array3";

window[newvarname] = [9,10,11,12];

This works because window in a browser is a predefined object that contains all the variables and the functions. You in addition to change and access globals using window you can also iterate over all the global variables:

// Collect names of all globally defined arrays
arrays = [];
for (var n in window) {
    if (window[n] && window[n].constructor == Array)
        arrays.push(n);
}

but I can think very few cases in which you may want to do that (if you have a function or a variable named "foo" and the directory contains a file named "foo", do you really want to destroy your function/variable?).

Probably you should simply use an object to store your files

var myobj = {};
myobj[filename] = ...;

He seems to want the exact opposite, getting the variable name out of the value — Bergi, Sep 22 '13 at 12:41

score 0 · Answer 3 · answered Sep 22 '13 at 12:44

You want to use an object where property names are programatically accessible:

var audioFiles = {
    "myArray": ['my', 'file', 'here'],
    "myArray2": ['some', 'more', 'files']
};

You can easily loop that object, and access the arrays dynamically via bracket notation.

Convert array name to string

3 Answers3