Optional chaining: (?.)
The optional chaining operator (?.) enables you to
read the value of a property located deep within a
chain of connected objects without having to
check that each reference in the chain is valid.
The ?. operator is like the . chaining operator,
except that instead of causing an error if a reference
is nullish (null or undefined), the expression returns
a value of undefined.
When used with function calls,
it returns undefined if the given function does not exist.
Example:
const adventurer = {
name: 'Alice',
cat: {
name: 'Dinah'
}
};
const dogName = adventurer.dog?.name;
console.log(dogName);
// output: undefined
console.log(adventurer.someNonExistentMethod?.());
// output: undefined
// Optional chaining
// Basically Optional chaining is use nested destructuring like shown below !!
// const obj = [{
// obj: {
// obj: "FAhad",
// },
//}]
// console.log(obj[0]?.obj?.obj);
// Like as you watched that How we are getting the elements from obj
const obj = [{
obj: {
},
}]
console.log(obj[0]?.obj?.obj);
// It's retruning undefined just because of optional chaining otherwise it'll return an error
// ----------THE END----------
The optional chaining operator provides a way to simplify accessing values through connected objects when it's possible that a reference or function may be undefined or null.
For example, consider an object obj which has a nested structure. Without optional chaining, looking up a deeply-nested subproperty requires validating the references in between, such as:
let nestedProp = obj.first && obj.first.second;
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The value of obj.first is confirmed to be non-null (and non-undefined) before then accessing the value of obj.first.second. This prevents the error that would occur if you accessed obj.first.second directly without testing obj.first.
With the optional chaining operator (?.), however, you don't have to explicitly test and short-circuit based on the state of obj.first before trying to access obj.first.second:
let nestedProp = obj.first?.second;
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By using the ?. operator instead of just ., JavaScript knows to implicitly check to be sure obj.first is not null or undefined before attempting to access obj.first.second. If obj.first is null or undefined, the expression automatically short-circuits, returning undefined.
This is equivalent to the following, except that the temporary variable is in fact not created:
let temp = obj.first;
let nestedProp = ((temp === null || temp === undefined) ? undefined : temp.second);
/*
* optional chaining (?.) allows me to write code that stops
* running when we encounter a null or undefined value
*/
function tryGetFirstElement<T>(arr?: T[]) {
return arr?.[0];
// equivalent to
// return (arr === null || arr === undefined) ?
// undefined :
// arr[0];
}