How to list the properties of a javascript object

Question

Say I create an object thus:

var myJSONObject =
        {"ircEvent": "PRIVMSG", "method": "newURI", "regex": "^http://.*"};

What is the best way to retrieve a list of the property names? i.e. I would like to end up with some variable 'keys' such that:

keys == ["ircEvent", "method", "regex"]

Thanks.

Answer 1

You can use the following and pass it an object.

var getKeys = function(obj){
   var keys = [];
   for(var key in obj){
      keys.push(key);
   }
   return keys;
}

Alternatively replace var getKeys with Object.prototype.keys to allow you to call .keys() on any object. Extending the prototype has some side effects and I wouldn't recommend doing it.

Answer 2

As slashnick pointed out, you can use the "for in" construct to iterate over an object for its attribute names. However you'll be iterating over all attribute names in the object's prototype chain. If you want to iterate only over the object's own attributes, you can make use of the Object#hasOwnProperty() method. Thus having the following.

for (var key in obj) {
    if (obj.hasOwnProperty(key)) {
        /* useful code here */
    }
}

Answer 3

IE does not support for(i in obj) for native properties. Here is a list of all the props I could find.

It seems stackoverflow does some stupid filtering.

The list is available at the bottom of this google group post:- https://groups.google.com/group/hackvertor/browse_thread/thread/a9ba81ca642a63e0

Answer 4

I'm a huge fan of the dump function.

http://ajaxian.com/archives/javascript-variable-dump-in-coldfusion

Answer 5

Note that Object.keys and other ECMAScript 5 methods are supported by Firefox 4, Chrome 6, Safari 5, IE 9 and above.

For example:

var o = {"foo": 1, "bar": 2}; 
alert(Object.keys(o));

ECMAScript 5 compatibility table: http://kangax.github.com/es5-compat-table/

Description of new methods: http://markcaudill.com/index.php/2009/04/javascript-new-features-ecma5/

Answer 6

As Sam Dutton answered, a new method for this very purpose has been introduced in ECMAScript 5th Edition. Object.keys() will do what you want and is supported in Firefox 4, Chrome 6, Safari 5 and IE 9.

You can also very easily implement the method in browsers that don't support it. However, some of the implementations out there aren't fully compatible with Internet Explorer. I've detailed this on my blog and produced a more compatible solution:

(function () {
    var hasOwnProperty = Object.prototype.hasOwnProperty,
        hasDontEnumBug = true,
        DontEnums = [ 
            'toString', 'toLocaleString', 'valueOf', 'hasOwnProperty',
            'isPrototypeOf', 'propertyIsEnumerable', 'constructor'
        ],
        DontEnumsLength = DontEnums.length;

    for (var k in {toString:null})
        hasDontEnumBug = false;

    Object.keys = Object.keys || function (o) {
        if (typeof o != "object" && typeof o != "function" || o === null)
            throw new TypeError("Object.keys called on a non-object");

        var result = [];
        for (var name in o) {
            if (hasOwnProperty.call(o, name))
                result.push(name);
        }

        if (hasDontEnumBug) {
            for (var i = 0; i < DontEnumsLength; i++) {
                if (hasOwnProperty.call(o, DontEnums[i]))
                    result.push(DontEnums[i]);
            }   
        }

        return result;
    };
})();

Note that the currently accepted answer doesn't include a check for hasOwnProperty() and will return properties that are inherited through the prototype chain. It also doesn't account for the famous DontEnum bug in Internet Explorer where non-enumerable properties on the prototype chain cause locally declared properties with the same name to inherit their DontEnum attribute.

Implementing Object.keys() will give you a more robust solution.

EDIT: following a recent discussion with kangax, a well-known contributor to Prototype, I implemented the workaround for the DontEnum bug based on code for his Object.forIn() function found here.