Javacript techniques: Fallbacks when destructuring nullable objects

JavaScript is a loosely typed language and thus your programs are prone to runtime errors. A runtime error is an error that occurs during the execution of the program, also known as the exceptions. In the example that is given below the program is syntactically correct , but at runtime it is trying to destructure a null object and throws an Error! ☹.

    let {name, age, favColour} = player1;
    // where player1 could be null

If we must do conditional destructuring and assignment with null-checks, then we might need to write-up boilerplate code to reduce the frequency of this kind of errors.

Let's see an example:

This code snippet checks if a variable is defined before assigning it to a class property . it thus prevent errors

if (file == undefined) {file = false} //prevents errors
  if (file) {
    this.file = file
  }

Back story

So this happened to me a while back. It took me a while to debug my code and find the culprit 😈 . Then I figured I returned a promise that made a function call and the data that was being passed was undefined 🤦‍♂️. So whenever you write a function that performs destructuring assignment. RULE OF THUMB; I mean always make sure you set a fallback and error checkers.

What is the most elegant way of using it in cases like that or should we use destructuring assignments only for guaranteed non-null objects?

You can use an empty object as fallback, and if object is null or undefined the assigned variables will be undefined.

Sample code snippet employing "empty object" as a fallback strategy

function printAge(player1 = {}) {
  const { age } = player1;
}

printAge(); // ✅ , no errors 👌

Another implementation of "empty object" as a fallback strategy

const player1 = null;
const { age, name, favColor } = player1 || {};

console.log(age, name, favColor);

Thanks guys for the audience 🤓! Connect with me on Twitter, linkedIn and Github And do drop your comments and reviews.

Javacript techniques: Fallbacks when destructuring nullable objects

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Back story

What is the most elegant way of using it in cases like that or should we use destructuring assignments only for guaranteed non-null objects?

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Comments (3)

More from this blog

Back story

What is the most elegant way of using it in cases like that or should we use destructuring assignments only for guaranteed non-null objects?