How do you clone an array of objects using underscore?

#!/usr/bin/env node
var _ = require('underscore');
var a = [{f: 1}, {f:5}, {f:10}];
var b = _.clone(a);
b[1].f = 55;
console.log(JSON.stringify(a));

This results in:

[{"f":1},{"f":55},{"f":10}]

Clone does not appear to be working! So I RTFM, and see this:

http://underscorejs.org/#clone

Create a shallow-copied clone of the object. Any nested objects or arrays will be copied by reference, not duplicated.

So _.clone is pretty useless. Is there a way to actually copy the array of objects?

Solution 1:

Well, there is a trick! If clone does not "clone" nested objects, you can force it to by explicitly cloning each object inside a map call! Like this:

#!/usr/bin/env node
var _ = require('underscore');
var a = [{f: 1}, {f:5}, {f:10}];
var b = _.map(a, _.clone);       // <----
b[1].f = 55;
console.log(JSON.stringify(a));

Prints:

[{"f":1},{"f":5},{"f":10}]

Yay! a is unchanged! I can now edit b to my liking!

Solution 2:

Another solution extracted from the issue on Github that works with any level of nested data, and does not require underscore:

JSON.parse(JSON.stringify(obj))

Solution 3:

FWIW, lodash has a cloneDeep function:

This method is like _.clone except that it recursively clones value.

Solution 4:

Underscore API reference:

_.toArray(list) Creates a real Array from the list (anything that can be iterated over). Useful for transmuting the arguments object.

...or in this case, cloning an array. Try this:

var _ = require('underscore');
var array1 =  [{a:{b:{c:1}}},{b:{c:{a:2}}},{c:{a:{b:3}}}];
var array2 = _.toArray(array1);
console.log(array1 === array2); --> false
console.log(array1[0] === array2[0]); --> true

The following is an addendum I created after Steve's comment below -thx

A Vanilla JS (or using _.clone if wanted) deep cloning recursive helper:

function clone(thing, opts) {
    var newObject = {};
    if (thing instanceof Array) {
        return thing.map(function (i) { return clone(i, opts); });
    } else if (thing instanceof Date) {
        return new Date(thing);
    } else if (thing instanceof RegExp) {
        return new RegExp(thing);
    } else if (thing instanceof Function) {
        return opts && opts.newFns ?
                   new Function('return ' + thing.toString())() :
                   thing;
    } else if (thing instanceof Object) {
        Object.keys(thing).forEach(function (key) {
            newObject[key] = clone(thing[key], opts);
        });
        return newObject;
    } else if ([ undefined, null ].indexOf(thing) > -1) {
        return thing;
    } else {
        if (thing.constructor.name === 'Symbol') {
            return Symbol(thing.toString()
                       .replace(/^Symbol\(/, '')
                       .slice(0, -1));
        }
        // return _.clone(thing);  // If you must use _ ;)
        return thing.__proto__.constructor(thing);
    }
}

var a = {
    a: undefined,
    b: null,
    c: 'a',
    d: 0,
    e: Symbol('a'),
    f: {},
    g: { a:1 },
    h: [],
    i: [ { a:2 }, { a:3 } ],
    j: [ 1, 2 ],
    k: function (a) { return a; },
    l: /[a-z]/g,
    z: [ {
        a: undefined,
        b: null,
        c: 'b',
        d: 1,
        e: Symbol(1),
        f: {},
        g: { b:2 },
        h: { c:{ c:3 } },
        i: { a:Symbol('b') },
        j: { a:undefined, b:null },
        k: [],
        l: [ 1, [ 1, 2 ], [ [ 1, 2, 3 ] ] ],
        m: function (a) { return !a; },
        n: { a:function (a) { return !!a; } },
        o: /(a|b)/i
       } ]
};
var b = clone(a);
var c = clone(a, { newFns:true });


/* Results - value beneath each for reference:

a.a === b.a --> true
undefined

a.b === b.b --> true
null

a.c === b.c --> true
'a'

a.d === b.d --> true
0

a.e === b.e --> false
Symbol(a)

a.f === b.f --> false
{}

a.g === b.g --> false
{ a:1 }

a.h === b.h --> false
[]

a.i === b.i --> false
[ { a:2 }, { a:3 } ]

a.i[0] === b.i[0] --> false
{ a:2 }

a.i[0].a === b.i[0].a --> true
2

a.j === b.j --> false
[ 1, 2 ]

a.k === b.k --> true
a.k === c.k --> false
function (a) { return a; }

a.l === b.l --> false
/[a-z]/g

a.z === b.z --> false
[Object]

a.z[0].a === b.z[0].a --> true
undefined

a.z[0].b === b.z[0].b --> true
null

a.z[0].c === b.z[0].c --> true
'b'

a.z[0].d === b.z[0].d --> true
1

a.z[0].e === b.z[0].e --> 
false
Symbol(1)

a.z[0].f === b.z[0].f --> false
{}

a.z[0].g === b.z[0].g -- > false
{ b:2 }

a.z[0].g.b === b.z[0].g.b --> true
2

a.z[0].h === b.z[0].h --> false
{ c:{ c:3 } }

a.z[0].h.c === b.z[0].h.c --> false
{ c:3 }

a.z[0].h.c.c === b.z[0].h.c.c --> true
3

a.z[0].i === b.z[0].i --> false
{ a:Symbol(b) }

a.z[0].i.a === b.z[0].i.a --> false
Symbol(b)

a.z[0].j === b.z[0].j --> false
{ a:undefined, b:null }

a.z[0].j.a === b.z[0].j.a --> true
undefined

a.z[0].k === b.z[0].k --> false
[]

a.z[0].l === b.z[0].l --> false
[ 1, [ 1, 2 ], [ [ 1, 2, 3 ] ] ]

a.z[0].l[1] === b.z[0].l[1] --> false
[ 1, 2 ]

a.z[0].l[1][1] === b.z[0].l[1][1] --> true
2

a.z[0].m === b.z[0].m --> true
a.z[0].m === c.z[0].m --> false
function (a) { return !a; }

a.z[0].n === b.z[0].n --> false
{ a:function (a) { return !!a; } }

a.z[0].n.a === b.z[0].n.a --> true
a.z[0].n.a === c.z[0].n.a --> false
function (a) { return !!a; }

a.z[0].o === b.z[0].o --> false
/(a|b)/i

*/