I have a generator called generateNumbers
in JavaScript and another generator generateLargerNumbers
which takes each value generated by generateNumbers
and applies a function addOne
to it, as such:
function addOne(value) {
return value + 1
}
function* generateNumbers() {
yield 1
yield 2
yield 3
}
function* generateLargerNumbers() {
for (const number of generateNumbers()) {
yield addOne(number)
}
}
Is there any terser way to do this without building an array out of the generated values? I'm thinking something like:
function* generateLargerNumbers() {
yield* generateNumbers().map(addOne) // obviously doesn't work
}
There isn't a built-in way to map over Generator
objects, but you could roll your own function:
const Generator = Object.getPrototypeOf(function* () {});
Generator.prototype.map = function* (mapper, thisArg) {
for (const val of this) {
yield mapper.call(thisArg, val);
}
};
Now you can do:
function generateLargerNumbers() {
return generateNumbers().map(addOne);
}
const Generator = Object.getPrototypeOf(function* () {});
Generator.prototype.map = function* (mapper, thisArg) {
for (const val of this) {
yield mapper.call(thisArg, val);
}
};
function addOne(value) {
return value + 1
}
function* generateNumbers() {
yield 1
yield 2
yield 3
}
function generateLargerNumbers() {
return generateNumbers().map(addOne)
}
console.log(...generateLargerNumbers())
higher-order generators
You can choose to manipulate the generator functions themselves
const Generator =
{
map: (f,g) => function* (...args)
{
for (const x of g (...args))
yield f (x)
},
filter: (f,g) => function* (...args)
{
for (const x of g (...args))
if (f (x))
yield x
}
}
// some functions !
const square = x =>
x * x
const isEven = x =>
(x & 1) === 0
// a generator !
const range = function* (x = 0, y = 1)
{
while (x < y)
yield x++
}
// higher order generator !
for (const x of Generator.map (square, Generator.filter (isEven, range)) (0,10))
console.log('evens squared', x)
higher-order iterators
Or you can choose to manipulate iterators
const Iterator =
{
map: (f, it) => function* ()
{
for (const x of it)
yield f (x)
} (),
filter: (f, it) => function* ()
{
for (const x of it)
if (f (x))
yield x
} ()
}
// some functions !
const square = x =>
x * x
const isEven = x =>
(x & 1) === 0
// a generator !
const range = function* (x = 0, y = 1)
{
while (x < y)
yield x++
}
// higher-order iterators !
for (const x of Iterator.map (square, Iterator.filter (isEven, range (0, 10))))
console.log('evens squared', x)
recommendation
In most cases, I think it's more practical to manipulate the iterator because of it's well-defined (albeit kludgy) interface. It allows you to do something like
Iterator.map (square, Iterator.filter (isEven, [10,11,12,13]))
Whereas the other approach is
Generator.map (square, Generator.filter (isEven, Array.from)) ([10,11,12,13])
Both have a use-case, but I find the former much nicer than the latter
persistent iterators
JavaScript's stateful iterators annoy me – each subsequent call to .next
alters the internal state irreversibly.
But! there's nothing stopping you from making your own iterators tho and then creating an adapter to plug into JavaScript's stack-safe generator mechanism
If this interests you, you might like some of the other accompanying examples found here: Loop to a filesystem structure in my object to get all the files
The only gain isn't that we can reuse a persistent iterator, it's that with this implementation, subsequent reads are even faster than the first because of memoisation – score: JavaScript 0, Persistent Iterators 2
// -------------------------------------------------------------------
const Memo = (f, memo) => () =>
memo === undefined
? (memo = f (), memo)
: memo
// -------------------------------------------------------------------
const Yield = (value, next = Return) =>
({ done: false, value, next: Memo (next) })
const Return = value =>
({ done: true, value })
// -------------------------------------------------------------------
const MappedIterator = (f, it = Return ()) =>
it.done
? Return ()
: Yield (f (it.value), () => MappedIterator (f, it.next ()))
const FilteredIterator = (f, it = Return ()) =>
it.done
? Return ()
: f (it.value)
? Yield (it.value, () => FilteredIterator (f, it.next ()))
: FilteredIterator (f, it.next ())
// -------------------------------------------------------------------
const Generator = function* (it = Return ())
{
while (it.done === false)
(yield it.value, it = it.next ())
return it.value
}
// -------------------------------------------------------------------
const Range = (x = 0, y = 1) =>
x < y
? Yield (x, () => Range (x + 1, y))
: Return ()
const square = x =>
x * x
const isEven = x =>
(x & 1) === 0
// -------------------------------------------------------------------
for (const x of Generator (MappedIterator (square, FilteredIterator (isEven, Range (0,10)))))
console.log ('evens squared', x)
How about composing an iterator object, instead of using the nested generators?
function* generateNumbers(){
yield 1;
yield 2;
yield 3;
}
function generateGreaterNumbers(){
return { next(){ var r = this.gen.next(); r.value+=1; return r; }, gen: generateNumbers() };`
}
If you need to actually pass values to your generator then you can't do it with for...of, you have to pass each value through
const mapGenerator = (generatorFunc, mapper) =>
function*(...args) {
let gen = generatorFunc(...args),
i = 0,
value;
while (true) {
const it = gen.next(value);
if (it.done) return mapper(it.value, i);
value = yield mapper(it.value, i);
i++;
}
};
function* generator() {
console.log('generator received', yield 1);
console.log('generator received', yield 2);
console.log('generator received', yield 3);
return 4;
}
const mapGenerator = (generatorFunc, mapper) =>
function*(...args) {
let gen = generatorFunc(...args),
i = 0,
value;
while (true) {
const it = gen.next(value);
if (it.done) return mapper(it.value, i);
value = yield mapper(it.value, i);
i++;
}
};
const otherGenerator = mapGenerator(generator, x => x + 1)
const it = otherGenerator();
console.log(
it.next().value,
it.next('a').value,
it.next('b').value,
it.next('c').value
);