convert a string to javascript object

Question

I have the following string

":All;true:Yes;false:&nbsp"

I want to convert is to an object like:

var listItems = 
[
{itemValue: "", itemText: "All"},
{itemValue: true, itemText: "Yes"},
{itemValue: false, itemText: "&nbsp"}
];

Any elegant way to doing this appreciated.

Community · Accepted Answer · 2017-05-23 12:33:58Z

12

With true/false boolean support:

var listItems = [];
var yourString = ":All;true:Yes;false:&nbsp";

var arr = yourString.split(";");
for (var i = 0; i < arr.length; i++) {
    var arr2 = arr[i].split(":");
    var value = arr2[0] || "";
    if (value == "true" || value == "false")
        value = (value === "true");
    listItems.push({
        itemValue : value,
        itemText : arr2[1] || ""
    });
}

console.log(listItems);

DEMO: http://jsfiddle.net/MZKFU/1/

UPDATE. For universal value parsing you can use JSON.parse method with try/catch block, as presented in Esailija's answer.

DEMO: http://jsfiddle.net/MZKFU/2/

edited May 23, 2017 at 12:33

CommunityBot

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answered May 24, 2012 at 8:39

VisioN

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4 Comments

Gareth McCaughan Over a year ago

You might want to make that var arr2 = arr[i].split(":",1) which will allow the values to include colons.

Johannes Fahrenkrug Over a year ago

Great, but we'd also have to handle "true" and "false": We don't want them to turn up as strings in the resulting JSON, but as booleans.

VisioN Over a year ago

@GarethMcCaughan It will work only if we have value on the right side :)

VisioN Over a year ago

@JohannesFahrenkrug Yep, I also have thought about that. Now it supports boolean.

Esailija · Accepted Answer · 2012-05-24 09:18:23Z

6

var str = ":All;true:Yes;false:&nbsp";
var listItems = str.split(/[;:]/g).map( function(v, i, arr){
    var itemValue;
    if( i % 2 ) {
        return;
    }

    try {
        itemValue = JSON.parse(v);
    }
    catch(e) {
        itemValue = v;
    }

    return {
        itemValue: itemValue,
        itemText: arr[i + 1]
    };
}).filter( Boolean );

Result:

[
Object
itemText: "All"
itemValue: ""
__proto__: Object
, 
Object
itemText: "Yes"
itemValue: true
__proto__: Object
, 
Object
itemText: "&nbsp"
itemValue: false
__proto__: Object
]

edited May 24, 2012 at 9:18

answered May 24, 2012 at 8:46

Esailija

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8 Comments

David Over a year ago

Best solution. its a shame 'map' isn't used more in javascript. Its been support in all the major browsers for a while now

VisioN Over a year ago

Really clever solution! However it fails if you have any string or number as a value. But it can be easily handled.

Esailija Over a year ago

@VisioN should handle it now. Though not strings (other than empty)

VisioN Over a year ago

I also tried to use JSON.parse here but it raises exception on any random symbol in the string.

Esailija Over a year ago

@Vision yes, currently the string needs to be a legit javascript literal (regexp, number, object, array, boolean, null, empty string, etc) or it fails

|

ZER0 · Accepted Answer · 2012-05-24 08:48:51Z

var string = ":All;true:Yes;false:&nbsp";
var array = string.split(/:|;/);

var listItems = [];

for (var i = 0; i < array.length; i += 2 ) {
    listItems.push({itemValue: array[i], itemText: array[i + 1]})
}

Notice that this will set "false" and "true" as string. Same for numbers if you have it. If you want save them with the proper types, you have to add a manual conversion. Something like:

function value(val) {
    if (!isNaN(val))
        return +val;

    if (val === "true")
        return true;

    if (val === "false")
        return false;

    return val;
}

Therefore the line that push the object to the array will change as below:

    listItems.push({itemValue: value(array[i]), itemText: array[i + 1]})

Pir Abdul · Accepted Answer · 2012-05-24 09:44:38Z

1

var myString = ":All;true:Yes;false:&nbsp"; 
var myArray = myString.split(';');
var literal = [];
for(var i = 0; i<myArray.length; i++){
  var mixed_string = myArray[i];
  var changed_array = mixed_string.split(":");
  var key = changed_array[0];
  var value = changed_array[1];
  literal.push({key:value});
}
console.log(literal);

answered May 24, 2012 at 9:44

Pir Abdul

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