Why does this work the way it does?

JavaScript
1

I am taking the course and I learn new things besides of what is written in the course.

Some of the things I see / learn I wonder how common would it be? and if they are like seen in a very particular case, or if they are more common?

Take this example:

function multiplyAll(arr) {
  var product = 1;
  // Only change code below this line
  for (var i = 0; i < arr.length; i++) {
    for (var j = 0; j < arr[i].length; j++) {
      product = product * arr[i][j];
    }
  }
  // Only change code above this line
  return product;
}

// Modify values below to test your code
multiplyAll([[1, 2], [3, 4], [5, 6, 7]]);

No, I am not taking about the nested array. More specifically I am talking about this line:

 product = product * arr[i][j];

There was no way in the world I was gonna get to the arr[i] [j]; obviously I don’ remember seen a code written that way before, and WHY would it work that way?

I ask WHY would this work this way because it seems very specific.

What if you want to do a math like:

([1 +2]+[3*4]-[5+6-7])

^^ A variation of adding, substracting, multiplication, division, I would think might be more common than straight multiplication for everything.

The arr[i] [j]; looks like a pretty neat trick. I just have to remember that using a function’s argument and adding the [i][j] from the nested array will multiply everything.

Is there a trick to include a shortcut for a mix of +, - , *, /, within the formula as well?

2

I don’t understand this line:

There was no way in the world I was gonna get to the arr[i] [j];

Are you talking about adding a space? Go ahead. JS doesn’t usually care about whitespace. But most people won’t and most linters would probably complain.

What if you want to do a math like:

([1 +2]+[3*4]-[5+6-7])

^^ A variation of adding, substracting, multiplication, division, I would think might be more common than straight multiplication for everything.

Is that “math math”? Then I don’t know what the brackets mean. Is that “JS math”? Then you are creating arrays and trying to add and subtract? What would that mean?

The arr[i] [j]; looks like a pretty neat trick. I just have to remember that using a function’s argument and adding the [i][j] from the nested array will multiply everything.

This does not multiply anything. This accesses a piece of data.

const arr [
  [1, 2, 3],
  [4, 5, 6],
  [7, 8, 9],
]

arr[0] // [1, 2, 3]

arr[0][1] // 2

arr[1][2] // 6

arr[2][0] // 7

There is multiplication happening above, just accessing elements in the array, or the arrays inside the array.

In the code:

product = product * arr[i][j];

The multiplication is happening because of product = product *, not because of arr[i][j] - that is just feeding a value to the multiplication.

1 Like
3

Yes, the product = product *, creates internal multiplication within the arr[i][j]

Yes, I mean, what if I want to do actual math math…

((1 +2)+(3*4)-(5+6-7))

I suppose I can find a long way to do by creating a bunch of variables and then creating a function that looks just like the math formula.

It was interesting that JS multiplies everything within the array when doing something like this:

product * arr[i][j];
4

Yes, the product = product *, creates internal multiplication within the arr[i][j]

This does not “create internal multiplication within the arr[i][j]”. That line multiplies product by a single value in the array, depending on the value of i and j. It is the looping and changing of those variables that is doing the work of hitting all of the values in the array.

Yes, I mean, what if I want to do actual math math…

((1 +2)+(3*4)-(5+6-7))

I suppose I can find a long way to do by creating a bunch of variables and then creating a function that looks just like the math formula.

OK, I think I see what you’re asking. How would you do more complex calculations on an array (or array of arrays) of data?

That is a hard question to answer because we don’t have enough information. Would it always be the first value added to the second, the third multiplied to the fourth, etc.? Would it depend on the size?

Clearly you’d need a more complicated function. You may not be able to use a loop. Maybe you could with some lookup table of actions, but grouping gets weird. You’d have to have some way to tell the function what to do. At that point, I would assume that the different values in the array have different meanings - at that point I would argue that an array isn’t the best data structure, maybe an object would make more sense.

Is there a trick to include a shortcut for a mix of +, - , *, /, within the formula as well?

Shortcut? No. Is it possible? Sure. Is it worth the complexity to keep this in a loop if that is what you need? Probably not.

But again, it’s very hard to say without knowing the use case.

2 Likes
5

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