JavaScript key
Return the key of the element currently pointed to by the internal array pointer
1 2 3 4 56 7 8 9 1011 12 13 14 1516 17 18 19 2021 22 23 24 2526 27 28 29 3031 32 33 34 3536 37 38 39 4041 42 43 44 4546 47 48 49 | function key (arr) { // Return the key of the element currently pointed to by the internal array pointer // // version: 1001.2911 // discuss at: http://phpjs.org/functions/key // + original by: Brett Zamir (http://brett-zamir.me) // + input by: Riddler (http://www.frontierwebdev.com/) // + bugfixed by: Brett Zamir (http://brett-zamir.me) // % note 1: Uses global: php_js to store the array pointer // * example 1: array = {fruit1: 'apple', 'fruit2': 'orange'} // * example 1: key(array); // * returns 1: 'fruit1' // BEGIN REDUNDANT this.php_js = this.php_js || {}; this.php_js.pointers = this.php_js.pointers || []; var indexOf = function (value) { for (var i = 0, length=this.length; i < length; i++) { if (this[i] === value) { return i; } } return -1; }; // END REDUNDANT var pointers = this.php_js.pointers; if (!pointers.indexOf) { pointers.indexOf = indexOf; } if (pointers.indexOf(arr) === -1) { pointers.push(arr, 0); } var cursor = pointers[pointers.indexOf(arr)+1]; if (!(arr instanceof Array)) { var ct = 0; for (var k in arr) { if (ct === cursor) { return k; } ct++; } return false; // Empty } if (arr.length === 0) { return false; } return cursor; } |
Examples
Running
1 2 | array = {fruit1: 'apple', 'fruit2': 'orange'} key(array); |
Should return
1 | 'fruit1' |
Dependencies
No dependencies, you can use this function standalone.
Open syntax issues
php.js uses JsLint to help us keep our code consistent and prevent some common bugs.
Eventually we want all code to pass or at least take into consideration most fixes suggested by JsLint, following this JsLint configuration we’ve decided on.
Authors
Thanks to the following developers, you get to have key goodness in JavaScript.

To elaborate on Riddler’s post, indexOf isn’t supported by Internet Explorer’s JScript, so this won’t work in any version of the browser, neither will the other functions: next, prev, pos, current, end, and reset.
Brett Zamir
26 Dec '09
@Theriault: Just saw your comment now. Yes, thanks, I caught those, and also a number of others. All should be fixed now. Thank heavens for Notepad++'s find files feature (I know IE does support the string indexOf at least, so I avoided doing anything for those).