@stein197/json-util NPM

Tiny library that provides utility functions to work with JSON structures

This tiny package provides common functions to work with JSON structures

Installation

For node:

npm i @stein197/equals

then

import * as jsonUtil from "@stein197/json-util";

For browser:

<script src="jsonUtil.min.js"></script>

The global scope will contain jsonUtil variable containing all functions inside.

Usage

The next example shows all available functions. More detailed description for the API rests in corresponding docblocks.

jsonUtil.equal({a: 1}, {a: 1}); // true
// Type checking
jsonUtil.isArray([]); // true
jsonUtil.isObject({}); // true
jsonUtil.isObject([]); // false
// Content checking
jsonUtil.isEmpty({}); // true
jsonUtil.isEmpty([]); // true
jsonUtil.isEmpty(""); // true
// Deep cloning
jsonUtil.clone([1, 2, 3]); // [1, 2, 3]
jsonUtil.clone({}) == {}; // false

The noticeable thing is equal() function that compares objects strictly and partially at the same time (without overhead). In addition to booleans, it also returns -1 and 1 if one object is super-/sub-set of another one respectively. The following example shows this difference:

jsonUtil.equal({}, {}); // true
jsonUtil.equal({a: 1}, {}); // 1, because the first object is a superset of the second one
jsonUtil.equal({}, {a: 1}); // -1, because the first object is a subset of the second one
jsonUtil.equal({a: 1, b: {c: 3}}, {a: 1}); // 1, it could include nested objects
jsonUtil.equal({a: 1, b: {c: 3}}, {b: {c: null}}); // false, fails here

If you mind a function that does "a lot", then use two distinct functions:

jsonUtil.strictlyEqual({a: 1}, {a: 1}); // true
jsonUtil.strictlyEqual({a: 1}, {}); // false
jsonUtil.partlyEqual({a: 1}, {a: 1}); // true
jsonUtil.partlyEqual({a: 1}, {}); // true, the second object is a subset of the first one
jsonUtil.partlyEqual({}, {a: 1}); // false, the first object is not a superset of the second one

NPM scripts

clean cleans working directory from compiled files
compile compiles source code
test runs unit tests
build builds the entire project (including tests). Outputs index.js for Node.js environment and jsonUtils.min.js for browser.