Javascript – Using symbol as object-key type in TypeScript

javascriptsymbolstypestypescript

I'm trying to define an object with a symbol as key-type since MDN says:

A symbol value may be used as an identifier for object properties […]

But using it as type for the key-property:

type obj = {
    [key: symbol | string]: string
}

results in the following error:

TS1023: An index signature parameter type must be either 'string' or 'number'.

even it can be used as index-type.
I'm using the latest typescript version (v3.7.2), related questions I've found:

Typescript: destructuring an object with symbols as keys (He's using an actual instance of a Symbol, I want the type symbol)
TypeScript: An index signature parameter must be a 'string' or 'number' when trying to use string | number
ES6: destructuring an object with symbols as keys (That can't be a solution – it seems kinda wrong to use an actual instance as type since every Symbol instance is unique…)

I've also took a look at the typescript symbol docs but they only show how it's used as value, not as type.

Example:

const obj = {} as {
    [key: number | symbol]: string // Won't work
};

const sym = Symbol('My symbol');
obj[sym] = 'Hi';

Issue on Microsoft/TypeScript

Open feature request

Best Answer

Unfortunately this is not possible at the moment in TypeScript. If you have to interoperate with some APIs that expect this or really want to use symbols as keys, you can do this awkward version:

// Ensure we can not pass regular map to our custom functions
type SymbolMapTag = { readonly symbol: unique symbol }

type SymbolMap = SymbolMapTag & {
    [Key in string | number | symbol]: string;
}

function set_symbol<T extends SymbolMap, TSym extends symbol>
(target: T, sym: TSym, value: T[TSym]) {
    target[sym] = value;
}

function get_symbol<T extends SymbolMap, TSym extends symbol>
(target: T, sym: TSym): T[TSym] {
    return target[sym];
}

const symbol_map = {} as SymbolMap;

const sym = Symbol('My symbol');
set_symbol(symbol_map, sym, "hi");
get_symbol(symbol_map, sym); // string


type NonSymbolMap = {
    [Key in string | number]: string;
}

const non_symbol_map = {} as NonSymbolMap;
set_symbol(non_symbol_map, sym, "hi"); // error
get_symbol(non_symbol_map, sym); // error

Native deep cloning

It's called "structured cloning", works experimentally in Node 11 and later, and hopefully will land in browsers. See this answer for more details.

Fast cloning with data loss - JSON.parse/stringify

If you do not use Dates, functions, undefined, Infinity, RegExps, Maps, Sets, Blobs, FileLists, ImageDatas, sparse Arrays, Typed Arrays or other complex types within your object, a very simple one liner to deep clone an object is:

JSON.parse(JSON.stringify(object))

const a = {
  string: 'string',
  number: 123,
  bool: false,
  nul: null,
  date: new Date(),  // stringified
  undef: undefined,  // lost
  inf: Infinity,  // forced to 'null'
  re: /.*/,  // lost
}
console.log(a);
console.log(typeof a.date);  // Date object
const clone = JSON.parse(JSON.stringify(a));
console.log(clone);
console.log(typeof clone.date);  // result of .toISOString()

See Corban's answer for benchmarks.

Reliable cloning using a library

Since cloning objects is not trivial (complex types, circular references, function etc.), most major libraries provide function to clone objects. Don't reinvent the wheel - if you're already using a library, check if it has an object cloning function. For example,

lodash - cloneDeep; can be imported separately via the lodash.clonedeep module and is probably your best choice if you're not already using a library that provides a deep cloning function
AngularJS - angular.copy
jQuery - jQuery.extend(true, { }, oldObject); .clone() only clones DOM elements
just library - just-clone; Part of a library of zero-dependency npm modules that do just do one thing. Guilt-free utilities for every occasion.

ES6 (shallow copy)

For completeness, note that ES6 offers two shallow copy mechanisms: Object.assign() and the spread syntax. which copies values of all enumerable own properties from one object to another. For example:

var A1 = {a: "2"};
var A2 = Object.assign({}, A1);
var A3 = {...A1};  // Spread Syntax

Javascript – Remove properties from objects (JavaScript)

To remove a property from an object (mutating the object), you can do it like this:

delete myObject.regex;
// or,
delete myObject['regex'];
// or,
var prop = "regex";
delete myObject[prop];

Demo

var myObject = {
    "ircEvent": "PRIVMSG",
    "method": "newURI",
    "regex": "^http://.*"
};
delete myObject.regex;

console.log(myObject);

For anyone interested in reading more about it, Stack Overflow user kangax has written an incredibly in-depth blog post about the delete statement on their blog, Understanding delete. It is highly recommended.

If you'd like a new object with all the keys of the original except some, you could use the destructuring.