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Object-Oriented JavaScript

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Object Literals and Components of Objects

2:51 with Ashley Boucher

Object literals are an important foundation for understanding object-oriented programming in JavaScript. Get to know object literals and the different components of objects.

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    [MUSIC] 0:00
    Hey there, welcome back. 0:04
    Congratulations on finishing the first stage of this course. 0:06
    I hope you're excited to keep learning about object oriented JavaScript. 0:09
    In the last stage, we started thinking conceptually about what objects are and 0:14
    how we use them. 0:18
    For this section of the course, 0:19
    we're going to continue our chat by talking about object literals. 0:20
    As a reminder, objects give us a way to package information about something we 0:24
    want to use in our code. 0:28
    This package is made up of a group of properties and functions, 0:30
    called methods, that work together to represent something in our program. 0:33
    Properties are like object specific variables that store information 0:38
    in a series of key value pairs. 0:41
    Methods are object specific functions that let your object do something or 0:44
    let something be done to it. 0:48
    Object literals are one way to create an object and 0:50
    they're really great when you're modeling only one single specific thing. 0:52
    Let's look at an example. 0:57
    At home I have a pet named Ernie, and 0:59
    I've created an object literal to model him in my code. 1:01
    To start, I declared a variable called ernie and 1:04
    set it equal to an empty set of curly braces. 1:07
    Curly braces are how we notate an object. 1:10
    Remember, the curly braces you use for 1:13
    objects are different than the square brackets you use to create an array. 1:15
    Inside the curly braces, I added a series of key value pairs that make up 1:19
    the three properties and one method inside this object literal. 1:23
    On the first line inside the curly braces, 1:28
    you will see the word animal, followed by a colon, followed by the string dog. 1:30
    This is a key value pair, and 1:34
    it is representing the animal property of this object literal. 1:36
    The key is the name of the property, and 1:39
    the value of the property follows after the colon. 1:41
    Property values don't have to just be strings. 1:44
    They can also be numbers, Booleans and even functions. 1:47
    In our example here, we've got three properties, 1:51
    animal, age and breed. 1:53
    An object literal's properties and methods are always separated by commas. 1:56
    Each new property or method is on its own line for readability. 2:00
    But technically, you don't have to do that for the syntax to be right. 2:04
    On the line after the breed property, you'll see another property called bark. 2:08
    But instead of a string value after the colon, there is a function declaration. 2:12
    This is one way to add methods to object literals. 2:16
    The property key is the name of the method, 2:19
    and that's the name you'll use when you want to call it. 2:21
    Putting all of these properties and methods into a package and 2:24
    attaching it to a variable is called encapsulation. 2:27
    That's an important term to remember, and 2:30
    you'll probably hear it a lot as you progress as a developer. 2:32
    Now that you know all about creating object literals, properties and 2:36
    methods, I bet you're super ready to start using these skills. 2:39
    Let's practice them a bit in a code challenge after this video. 2:42
    After that, come back and join me to learn all about how we access and 2:45
    use properties and methods. 2:49

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