How to access invalid JavaScript identifiers?

Asked Mar 13 '18 at 17:21

Active Mar 13 '18 at 17:39

Viewed 103 times

In JavaScript, you could access properties with both, bracket and dot notations like so:

var person = {
    firstname: 'Jhon',
    lastname: 'Doe'
};

console.log(person.firstname + ' ' + person.lastname);
console.log(person['firstname'] + ' ' + person['lastname']);

And, if I did something like the following:

var person = {
    'first name': 'Jhon',
    'last name': 'Doe'
};

// The following won't work:
// console.log(person.first name + ' ' + person.last name);

console.log(person['first name'] + ' ' + person['last name']);

My question is: Is there a trick or a hack to access person['first name'] and person['last name'] with the dot notation?

edited Mar 13 '18 at 17:39

asked Mar 13 '18 at 17:21

CryptoBird

3

Is there a trick? No. You can't access those properties without using bracket notation. – Heretic Monkey Mar 13 '18 at 17:22
So, it's impossible, right ? – CryptoBird Mar 13 '18 at 17:24
1

One possible solution might be: Read the keys from the object. For each key that includes a space, replace the space with some other character such as `_`, remove the key from the object, assign the property to the new key, then you can use the new key to read as dot-notation. I don't have a readily-available implementation. – Mar 13 '18 at 17:24
@Thebluefish : great idea, but is there a way to access it directly , may be using unicode or something ? – CryptoBird Mar 13 '18 at 17:30
2

Why do you want to use dot notation.... what is the benefit – epascarello Mar 13 '18 at 17:31
@epascarello : It's just for learning purposes. – CryptoBird Mar 13 '18 at 17:32
@Thebluefish Thanks man, you're AWESOME , I didn't know about the Object.keys() . – CryptoBird Mar 13 '18 at 17:42
1

See also https://mathiasbynens.be/notes/javascript-identifiers-es6 a good source for JavaScript identifier tricks. – Heretic Monkey Mar 13 '18 at 17:44

How to access invalid JavaScript identifiers?

0 Answers0