JavaScript access string chars as array
JavascriptJavascript Problem Overview
Is it ok to do this:
var myString="Hello!";
alert(myString[0]); // shows "H" in an alert window
Or should it be done with either charAt(0) or substr(0,1)? By "is it ok" I mean will it work on most browsers, is there a best practice recommandation that says otherwise etc.
Thank you.
Javascript Solutions
Solution 1 - Javascript
Accessing characters as numeric properties of a string is non-standard prior to ECMAScript 5 and doesn't work in all browsers (for example, it doesn't work in IE 6 or 7). You should use myString.charAt(0) instead when your code has to work in non-ECMAScript 5 environments. Alternatively, if you're going to be accessing a lot of characters in the string then you can turn a string into an array of characters using its split() method:
var myString = "Hello!";
var strChars = myString.split("");
alert(strChars[0]);
Solution 2 - Javascript
Using charAt is probably the best idea since it conveys the intent of your code most accurately. Calling substr for a single character is definitely an overkill.
alert(myString.charAt(0));
Solution 3 - Javascript
2018 answer: Yes it is OK to access strings like arrays.
The syntax is clear and concise. IE6 and IE7 are long gone. I see no reason not to use it.
Solution 4 - Javascript
In ES6 we can use destructuring since a string can be treated as an array:
const [...rest] = 'Hello!';
console.log(rest)
> Array ["H", "e", "l", "l", "o", "!"]
console.log(rest[0])
> "H"