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JavaScript JavaScript Loops, Arrays and Objects Tracking Data Using Objects The Student Record Search Challenge Solution

adam åslund
PLUS
adam åslund
Courses Plus Student 12,184 Points
Posted by adam åslund
adam åslund
Courses Plus Student 12,184 Points

My solution for the student record search challenge.

This is how I solved the additional challenges that Dave provided. 

var message = '';
var search;
var student;
var noStudent = false; //Use false here so that user can keep searching even after no student was found

function print(message) {
  var div = document.getElementById('output');
  div.innerHTML = message;
};

function getStudentReport (student) {
  var report = '<h2> Student: ' + student.name + '</h2>';
  report += '<p> Track: ' + student.track + '</p>';
  report += '<p> Achievements: ' + student.achievements + '</p>';
  report += '<p> points: ' + student.points + '</p>';
  return report;
};

while(true){
  search = prompt('Search for students. Type "list" to show all students and "quit" to exit the search.');
  if (search === null || search.toLowerCase() === 'quit') {
    break;
  };
  for (var i = 0; i < students.length; i += 1) {
  student = students[i];
    if (search.toLowerCase() === student.name.toLowerCase()) {
      message += getStudentReport(student); // adding += adds the second getStudentReport after the first instead of overwriting it. 
      print(message);
      noStudent = true;
    }
  };
  if (!noStudent) {  // This if statment is to solve the problem if a student dosen't exist.
    print('<p> No student named ' + search + '</p>');
  };
  message ='';  // comment this out if you want searches to stay
  noStudent = false; //Resets noStudent = false again and the user can keep on searching.
}

Is there any obvious mistakes or improvements to DRY I more than thankful for any input.

Nicholas Woods
Nicholas Woods
6,260 Points
Nicholas Woods
Nicholas Woods
6,260 Points

I had trouble outputting 'No student by such name' working in my loop. I know it is more to do with me still coming to grips with the syntax, but it was occasionally throwing up the 'No student' alert for students in the array. So I used a function. I would be interested in what the experts think is a better practice. It is good seeing what other people do. 

function indexByKey(array, value) {
  for (var i = 0; i < array.length; i++) {
    if (array[i].Name === value) {
      return array[i];
    }
  }
    return null;
}

2 Answers

Ira Bradley
Ira Bradley
12,976 Points

Very minor syntax stuff. You don't need to end functions with a semi-colon. Also i += 1 can be represented as i++.

adam åslund
adam åslund
Courses Plus Student 12,184 Points
adam åslund
adam åslund
Courses Plus Student 12,184 Points

Thanks! I'm not sure why I add the semi-colons, seems to be a habit to avoid forgetting one. I normally use i++ since it comes automatic when you expand a for loop in sublime. But since Dave used it in this course I didn't go back and change it.

Ira Bradley
Ira Bradley
12,976 Points
Ira Bradley
Ira Bradley
12,976 Points

You also can read up on array.reduce() array.filter() and array.map(). I would consider using array.reduce() instead of your for loop. This might help. Let me know if you can't figure it out and I'll post a code example. https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Array/Reduce