Benchmark: ref?.current? vs ref.current? when current = null

Script Preparation code:

var _a$current; 
var a = {  current: null };

Tests:

a?.current?.();
a === null || a === void 0 || (_a$current = a.current) === null || _a$current === void 0 ? void 0 : _a$current.call(a);
a.current?.();
(_a$current = a.current) === null || _a$current === void 0 ? void 0 : _a$current.call(a);

Rendered benchmark preparation results:

Suite status: <idle, ready to run>

Previous results

Test case name	Result
a?.current?.();
a.current?.();

Fastest: N/A

Slowest: N/A

Latest run results:

Run details: (Test run date: 5 months ago)

User agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10_15_7) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/142.0.0.0 Safari/537.36

Browser/OS: Chrome 142 on Mac OS X 10.15.7

View result in a separate tab

Test name	Executions per second
a?.current?.();	16986746.0 Ops/sec
a.current?.();	17239554.0 Ops/sec

Autogenerated LLM Summary (model llama3.2:3b, generated one year ago):

LLMs can make mistakes. Check important info.

Let's break down the provided benchmark and explain what's being tested.

**Benchmark Definition JSON**

The benchmark is defined in the `Benchmark Definition` field, which represents a JavaScript expression or statement that will be executed during the benchmarking process. In this case, there are two test cases:

1. `a === null || a === void 0 || (_a$current = a.current) === null || _a$current === void 0 ? void 0 : _a$current.call(a);`
2. `_a$current = a.current;` and then `(_a$current = a.current).call(a);`

These expressions are designed to test the behavior of optional chaining (`?.`) in JavaScript.

**Optional Chaining (`?.`)**

Optional chaining is a new feature introduced in ECMAScript 2020 (ES12) that allows you to access nested properties or call methods on an object, while avoiding null pointer exceptions. The `?.` syntax is used to specify the safe navigation operator.

In the benchmark, two variants of optional chaining are being tested:

1. **a?.current?.();**: This expression uses optional chaining twice: first to check if `a` is truthy, and then to call the `current` property on it. If either part fails (i.e., `a` is falsy or `a.current` is null/undefined), the entire expression returns undefined.
2. **(_a$current = a.current) === null || _a/current === void 0 ? void 0 : _aURRENT.call(a);**: This expression uses optional chaining in a more traditional way: it first checks if `a.current` is truthy, and then calls the result of `_a$current` (which is `a.current`) on `a`. If either part fails, the expression returns undefined.

**Library**

In both test cases, the `var _a$current;` and `var a = { current: null };` lines introduce a variable `a` with a nested property `current`. This suggests that the benchmark is designed to isolate the behavior of optional chaining from other JavaScript features or variables.

**Pros and Cons of Different Approaches**

Here's a brief analysis of the two approaches:

1. **Using `?.` twice**: This approach provides additional safety checks by using optional chaining twice, ensuring that even if `a` is falsy or `a.current` is null/undefined, the expression will not throw an exception.
2. **Traditional optional chaining**: This approach relies on the traditional way of using optional chaining, where the operator returns undefined if the preceding operand is null or undefined.

Pros:

* The first approach provides an additional layer of safety and robustness.
Cons:

* It may introduce performance overhead due to the extra checks.

The second approach is more concise but also introduces more risk in case `a.current` is falsy.

**Considerations**

When using optional chaining, it's essential to remember that it can be used for both property access (e.g., accessing a nested property) and method calls (e.g., calling a function on an object). The benchmark highlights the importance of understanding how to use this operator effectively in different scenarios.

**Other Alternatives**

There are other alternatives to testing optional chaining, such as:

1. Testing with different data types (e.g., objects with different numbers of properties or nested structures).
2. Evaluating its performance under heavy loads or resource-constrained environments.
3. Examining how it interacts with other JavaScript features, like nullish coalescing (`??`) and the `in` operator.

However, the provided benchmark provides a solid example of testing optional chaining's behavior in a controlled environment.

Related benchmarks:

ref?.current? vs ref.current? when current = null (version: 0)

Comparing performance of: a?.current?.(); vs a.current?.();

Created: 2 years ago by: Guest

Jump to the latest result

a?.current?.();

a.current?.();

Suite status: <idle, ready to run>

Fastest: N/A

Slowest: N/A

Autogenerated LLM Summary (model llama3.2:3b, generated one year ago):