Return object in javascript array with lowest value

Question

I have an array of cities that contain a key "distance"

ajax = new Location('123 main street', 'city, ON', 'L9Z 0K5', '905-555-5555', '905-555-555', 43.864362, -79.011627, 6);
alliston = new Location('117 Young Street', 'place, ON', 'L5R 0E9', '705-555-1234', '705-444-4321', 44.147691, -79.884193, 15);
aurora = new Location('2 New Place', 'capitol, ON', 'L8G 3W8', '905-999-0155', '905-727-5678', 44.009139, -79.470980, 1);
brampton = new Location('50 Circle Cres.', 'wendy, ON', 'L9r 8S1', '905-888-8888', null, 43.680537, -79.714164, 25);

These objects (where the last key is distance) are stored in an array called cities

How can I loop through cities and print the object that contains the lowest distance?

nullpotent · Accepted Answer · 2013-12-04 18:14:09Z

2

cities.reduce(function(a, b) {
 return (b.distance < a.distance)  ? b : a;
})

||

cities.sort(function(a, b) {
 return a.distance - b.distance;
})[0]

edited Dec 4, 2013 at 18:14

answered Dec 4, 2013 at 1:40

nullpotent

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8 Comments

Ethan Brown Over a year ago

-1: The first one doesn't work; I tried it. It's using Array.reduce incorrectly.

nullpotent Over a year ago

@EthanBrown Care to explain? For what input does it fail?

Ethan Brown Over a year ago

Nope. I don't think you're getting how Array.reduce works. If you pass in Number.MIN_VALUE as a seed, the test will always fail (because Number.MIN_VALUE does not have a property distance, so you will always have (some number) < undefined, which will always return false). See my answer below using reduce, which works, and has been tested.

Ethan Brown Over a year ago

This is the array I've been testing against: [{distance:5},{distance:7},{distance:2}]. Your current incarnation, it returns 5e-324 (aka Number.MIN_VALUE). For your previous one, it returned {distance:5}.

nullpotent Over a year ago

@EthanBrown Thank you, you were patient with me and I appreciate it. You deserve an upvote. Please do tell if there's something wrong now?

|

Ethan Brown · Accepted Answer · 2013-12-04 18:25:39Z

1

You can use the reduce method of Array (I'm assuming here your Location object has a property called distance; adjust accordingly):

var nearest = [ajax,alliston,aurora,brampton]
    .reduce( function( nearest, location ) { 
        return !nearest || location.distance < nearest.distance 
            ? location : nearest;
    } );

Note: iccthedral's solution using reduce is a little neater than mine, thanks to his clever use of reduce's behavior if you don't supply an initial value. From MDN: "If no initialValue was provided, then [the first argument passed to the callback] will be equal to the first value in the array."

edited Dec 4, 2013 at 18:25

answered Dec 4, 2013 at 1:43

Ethan Brown

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Comments

eRIZ · Accepted Answer · 2013-12-04 01:35:00Z

0

Put them into an object/array and create custom sort function: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Array/sort

...which will sort this array by distance.

answered Dec 4, 2013 at 1:35

eRIZ

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Comments

mrmoment · Accepted Answer · 2013-12-04 01:37:12Z

0

I guess you want to use arrayObject.sort(sortby); and define your sortby function (e.g., return loc_a.distance - loc_b.distance).

answered Dec 4, 2013 at 1:37

mrmoment

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