Benchmark: mduke-test - MeasureThat.net

HTML Preparation code:

<div id="foo" data-episode="000000000"></div>

Tests:

getAttribute
var element = document.getElementById("foo"); var i = 1000; while (i--) { element.getAttribute("data-episode"); }
attributes
var element = document.getElementById("foo"); var i = 1000; while (i--) { element.attributes["data-episode"].value; }
dataset
var element = document.getElementById("foo"); var i = 1000; while (i--) { element.dataset.episode; }

Rendered benchmark preparation results:

Suite status: <idle, ready to run>

Previous results

Test case name	Result
getAttribute
attributes
dataset

Fastest: N/A

Slowest: N/A

Latest run results:

Run details: (Test run date: 18 days ago)

User agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10_15_7) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/134.0.0.0 Safari/537.36

Browser/OS: Chrome 134 on Mac OS X 10.15.7

View result in a separate tab

Test name	Executions per second
getAttribute	47433.7 Ops/sec
attributes	13351.0 Ops/sec
dataset	18459.2 Ops/sec

Autogenerated LLM Summary (model gpt-4o-mini, generated 18 days ago):

LLMs can make mistakes. Check important info.

The benchmark defined in the provided JSON evaluates three different methods for accessing the `data-episode` attribute of an HTML element in JavaScript. The purpose is to assess performance differences between these methods under specific conditions.

### Test Cases

1. **getAttribute Method**
   ```javascript
   var element = document.getElementById("foo");
   var i = 1000;
   while (i--) {
       element.getAttribute("data-episode");
   }
   ```
   - **Description**: This test case uses the `getAttribute` method to retrieve the value of the `data-episode` attribute. The `getAttribute` method takes a string parameter that specifies the name of the attribute.
   - **Performance Result**: Executions per second: **47,433.71**
   - **Pros**:
     - Widely supported across all browsers.
     - Flexible for retrieving any attribute, not just custom data attributes.
   - **Cons**:
     - Generally slower than accessing the `dataset` property for data attributes since it involves string processing to match the attribute name.

2. **attributes Property**
   ```javascript
   var element = document.getElementById("foo");
   var i = 1000;
   while (i--) {
       element.attributes["data-episode"].value;
   }
   ```
   - **Description**: In this test, the `attributes` property of the element is used to directly access the specified attribute using its name as a key. This returns an `NamedNodeMap` containing all attributes of the element.
   - **Performance Result**: Executions per second: **13,351.03**
   - **Pros**:
     - Direct access to the attributes, which could be slightly faster than `getAttribute`.
   - **Cons**:
     - Less common and slightly more verbose than using `getAttribute` or `dataset`.
     - It requires more care because you must handle the case where the attribute does not exist, which could lead to errors.

3. **dataset Property**
   ```javascript
   var element = document.getElementById("foo");
   var i = 1000;
   while (i--) {
       element.dataset.episode;
   }
   ```
   - **Description**: This test accesses the same `data-episode` attribute using the `dataset` property, which is a DOMStringMap that provides a convenient way to access data attributes.
   - **Performance Result**: Executions per second: **18,459.16**
   - **Pros**:
     - Very readable and straightforward.
     - Automatically handles transforming data attributes from the HTML (`data-episode` becomes `element.dataset.episode`).
   - **Cons**:
     - Only works with `data-*` attributes, making it less versatile than `getAttribute`.
     - Performance might be slower than direct property access via `attributes`, although it's generally fast for data attributes.

### Summary of Performance

From the benchmark results:
- The **getAttribute** method performed the best in terms of executions per second, making it the fastest option among the three tested methods. 
- The **dataset** method was the middle performer. It provides a simpler syntax with good readability while being fairly fast for accessing data attributes.
- The **attributes** method was the slowest, which suggests that while it offers direct access to attributes, it’s not as efficient for performance-focused applications.

### Other Considerations

- **Browser Compatibility**: All three methods are generally compatible with modern browsers, but it is always good practice to verify in case of older environments.
- **Maintenance and Readability**: Code maintainability may be a factor in choosing which method to use, as readability can significantly impact collaboration in team environments.

### Alternatives

In addition to these methods:
- **JavaScript Frameworks**: Libraries like jQuery abstract some of this functionality. For instance, jQuery would allow for easy manipulation and access to attributes via methods like `$(element).data("episode")`, which internally handles cross-browser compatibility issues.
- **Custom Functions**: For complex applications, developers often write custom functions or wrappers around these methods, especially when multiple attributes need to be accessed or manipulated conditionally.

Overall, while performance is an important factor, considerations such as developer experience, readability, and the specific use case should inform the selection of the method for accessing attributes.

Related benchmarks:

mduke-test (version: 1)

Comparing performance of: getAttribute vs attributes vs dataset

Created: 18 days ago by: Guest

Jump to the latest result

getAttribute

attributes

dataset

Suite status: <idle, ready to run>

Experimental features:

Fastest: N/A

Slowest: N/A

Autogenerated LLM Summary (model gpt-4o-mini, generated 18 days ago):