Extending Object.prototype JavaScript

by

UPDATE from 2021

Despite this being the accepted answer, 10 years of experience has taught me this isn’t the best idea. Pretty much anything you can do avoid polluting the global scope is a very very good thing.

Original answer below, for posterity, and because stack overflow will not let me delete an accepted answer.

Original answer from 2011

I think it’s fine if it works in your target environment.

Also I think prototype extension paranoia is overblown. As long as you use hasOwnProperty() like a good developer that it’s all fine. Worst case, you overload that property elsewhere and lose the method. But that’s your own fault if you do that.

More Related Contents:

  1. Find list of strings that matches a pattern that start with a special character « and end with a special character »
  2. Which is the fastest way to loop? [for curiosity]
  3. What is the purpose of the var keyword and when should I use it (or omit it)?
  4. Get array of object’s keys
  5. Dynamically set property of nested object
  6. What does [].forEach.call() do in JavaScript?
  7. how to stop Javascript forEach? [duplicate]
  8. Is it true that every function in JavaScript is a closure?
  9. Why is it Object.defineProperty() rather than this.defineProperty() (for objects)?
  10. Creating range in JavaScript – strange syntax
  11. Automatic semicolon insertion & return statements [duplicate]
  12. Why were ES5 Object methods not added to Object.prototype?
  13. What is the difference between ‘let’ and ‘const’ ECMAScript 2015 (ES6)?
  14. Why are Objects not Iterable in JavaScript?
  15. Why do catch clauses have their own lexical environment?
  16. How to explain object references in ECMAScript terms?
  17. Object.keys() complexity?
  18. Getting a reference to the global object in an unknown environment in strict mode
  19. Why and how does ([![]]+[][[]])[+!+[]+[+[]]] evaluate to the letter “i”? [duplicate]
  20. Can I disable ECMAscript strict mode for specific functions?
  21. Why is delete not allowed in Javascript5 strict mode?
  22. What object javascript function is bound to (what is its “this”)?
  23. Regex only capturing last instance of capture group in match
  24. Object.defineProperty in ES5?
  25. What Internal Property In ECMAScript is defined for?
  26. gulp babel, exports is not defined
  27. How to understand JS realms
  28. Why are Octal numeric literals not allowed in strict mode (and what is the workaround?)
  29. Do not include in random number
  30. Load javascript async, then check DOM loaded before executing callback

Leave a Comment