arrays.md

Small notes and shortcuts for handling arrays

Counting the occurrences / frequency of array elements with ES6

const a = [5, 5, 5, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 9, 4];

const aCount = new Map([...new Set(a)].map(
    x => [x, a.filter(y => y === x).length]
));

aCount.get(5)  // 3
aCount.get(2)  // 5
aCount.get(9)  // 1
aCount.get(4)  // 1

This example passes the input array to the Set constructor creating a collection of unique values. The spread syntax then expands these values into a new array so we can call map and translate this into a two-dimensional array of [value, count] pairs - i.e. the following structure:

Array [
   [5, 3],
   [2, 5],
   [9, 1],
   [4, 1]
]

The new array is then passed to the Map constructor resulting in an iterable object:

Map {
    5 => 3,
    2 => 5,
    9 => 1,
    4 => 1
}

The great thing about a Map object is that it preserves data-types - that is to say aCount.get(5) will return 3 but aCount.get("5") will return undefined. It also allows for any value / type to act as a key meaning this solution will also work with an array of objects.

stackoverflow

Change all values in an array to a specific value

const array = [1, 2, 3, 4];

array.fill(4) // array = [4, 4, 4, 4]