How would you use these two conceptually different approaches to writing javaScript Objects

Question

This is a little bit of a noob question, but coming from a server side (PHP) background, I am struggling a little with the conceptual differences between the different ways of creating javaScript objects and classes.

I have two snippets, which represent the same code, but implemented in different ways.

What I want to know if when and why would you choose one over the other?

var foo = {
init: function() {
    console.log('loading...');
    console.log(this.param);
    return this;
},
param: '5',
bar: function(){
    console.log('bar bar');
    this.black();
    this.sheep();

    return this;
}, 
black: function(){
    console.log('black');
    return this;
}, 
sheep: function(){
    console.log('sheep');
    console.log(this.param);
    return this;
}
};
foo.init().bar();

Then there is option two:

var foo = function(){
return {
    init: function() {
        console.log('loading...');
        console.log(this.param);
        return this;
    },
    param: '5',
    bar: function(){
        console.log('bar bar');
        this.black();
        this.sheep();

        return this;
    }, 
    black: function(){
        console.log('black');
        return this;
    }, 
    sheep: function(){
        console.log('sheep');
        console.log(this.param);
        return this;
    }
};
}
foo().init().bar();

Why would you use the return {} in the second example?

score 4 · Answer 1 · edited Sep 05 '13 at 08:30

by using return like that, you can implement the revealing module design pattern, however I can't see any use case in your examples. OOP is really based on what you need. I encourage you to first look for what you really need to do, then look for a proper design pattern to fit your needs.

P.S. I assume that you have seen some examples but you really didn't get the idea behind them, so you thought that they are same. Honestly your second example doesn't make any sense to me, but I might be wrong.

P.P.S. OOP in PHP is so different to OOP in Javascript. That might be a reason for your confusion I guess.

How would you use these two conceptually different approaches to writing javaScript Objects

1 Answers1