So ES 6 is bringing us Maps (and none too soon). Wishing to subclass Map for my own nefarious purposes, I tried the following (abbreviated for clarity):
function Foo() {
return Map.apply(this, [].slice.call(arguments));
}
var bar = new Foo();
In V8 environments this throws an Error "Map constructor not called with 'new'". Why? SpiderMonkey gets this 'right':
Map.call({}, [['foo', 'bar']]).get('foo');
will, as expected, yield 'bar'. In both SpiderMonkey and V8 attempting something like
function Foo() {};
Foo.prototype = new Map();
var bar = new Foo();
bar.set('foo', 'bar');
will fail: 'method set called on incompatible object'. So there goes that inheritance pattern. As far as I can tell from the spec (I don't have much spec-foo), actual Map objects have internal properties that are not accessible that are required for them to work properly. But why does V8 throw an error on the first pattern? This seems like an odd decision, especially when it works as expected in FF.
UPDATE: I noticed that FF and chrome both have Object.setPrototypeOf
implemented. Just in case anyone stumbles across this and thinks of that, I can tell you it fails. Both of the following fail for different reasons:
//this totally fails, even for custom constructors/objects
var Foo = function(){};
Object.setPrototypeOf(Foo, Map.prototype);
var bar = new Foo(); //bar doesn't have any of the Map properties/methods
//this one has the methods but still throws the 'incompatible object'
//err. Also fails with new Map() instead of Map.prototype
var bar = Object.setPrototypeOf({}, Map.prototype);
TL;DR
There are basically four ways to extend map (some from answers/comments below):
- Add methods to Map.prototype (shame on you).
- Factory/constructor makes objects with an internal Map instance that you delegate to
- Mixin fn that copies properties onto Maps:
function Foo(){this.bar = 'boo!'}
var baz = new Map();
Foo.call(baz);
baz.bar; //yields 'boo!'
baz.set('5', 5).get('5'); //yields 5
Or just wait for ES 6 classes to hit the platform(s) you care about