Traverse nested maps / objects from keys in an array

Question

I think a code sample is going to work a lot better than my vocabulary:

var keys = ['folder','name'];

var data = { folder: { name: 'Special Folder' } };

Given the two vars above, I'm looking for a way to dynamically use the array as a way to look up the object keys (sort of like a "path"). So I need to programmatically produce the following:

data['folder']['name'] // that would give me 'Special Folder'

Hopefully this makes sense, I just can't quite put all the pieces together.

TIA

Iterate through the array, looking up the value in the "current" map, starting with the top and carrying the next on ;) — sea-rob
– sea-rob, Commented Dec 31, 2014 at 7:23
Not sure this question really belongs here, there's not much to this: jsfiddle.net/5ftkcbpe — Dagg Nabbit
– Dagg Nabbit, Commented Dec 31, 2014 at 7:27
@Hey I'm not sure why this didn't click. I've done this very thing more than couple times in the past, but tonight I just couldn't put it into code for some reason. Thanks — rpaskett
– rpaskett, Commented Dec 31, 2014 at 7:32
@rpaskett no problem... this one won't throw anything if it can't resolve, it'll just return undefined. Change (target || {}) to target if you want it to throw an error for a set of keys it can't resolve. — Dagg Nabbit
– Dagg Nabbit, Commented Dec 31, 2014 at 7:33
Actually reduce would make more sense: jsfiddle.net/5ftkcbpe/1 — Dagg Nabbit
– Dagg Nabbit, Commented Dec 31, 2014 at 7:43

Lewis · Accepted Answer · 2015-02-06 04:54:50Z

1

var keys = ['folder','name'];
var data = { folder: { name: 'Special Folder' } };
for(var i=0;i<keys.length;i++){
    data = data[keys[i]];
}
alert(data)

answered Feb 6, 2015 at 4:54

Lewis

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