Using a method name as the value for an instance variable

Question

I'm trying to round out my Javascript knowledge. This seems like such a simple thing, yet it's puzzling me.

I have a need to store a method name as a variable. Reducing my test case to the smallest possible size, results in the following:

var someobj = { 
  someMethod: function() {
      console.log('woo');
  }, 
  somevariable: this.someMethod
}

There are no callbacks, everything's nice and simple.

console.log(someobj.someMethod);

Returns:

[Function]

Great. But:

console.log(someobj.somevariable)

Returns:

undefined

I was expecting it to return '[Function]'. Why is this?

Thanks.

Dennis · Accepted Answer · 2012-01-29 16:28:06Z

1

When declaring objects in JSON - format, there is no this keyword. (well, there is, but i refers to the this of the outer context, for example window in a global context) You cannot access the current object in such a declaration. You will thus need to set that variable afterwards, something like this:

var someobj = { 
  someMethod: function() {
      console.log('woo');
  } 
}
someobj.somevariable = someobj.someMethod;

answered Jan 29, 2012 at 16:28

Dennis

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