Object.prototype.toString()

The toString() 은 문자열을 반환하는 object의 대표적인 방법이다

toString() 함수는 어떠한 객체를 나타내는 문자열을 return한다.

구문

obj.toString()

Description

모든 객체에는 객체가 텍스트 값으로 표시되거나 객체가 문자열이 예상되는 방식으로 참조 될 때 자동으로 호출되는 toString() 메서드가 있습니다. 기본적으로 toString() 메서드는 Object에서 비롯된 모든 객체에 상속됩니다. 이 메서드가 사용자 지정 개체에서 재정의되지 않으면 toString()은 "[object type]"을 반환합니다. 여기서 type은 object type입니다. 다음 코드는 이것을 설명합니다

var o = new Object();
o.toString(); // returns [object Object]

Examples

Overriding the default toString method

You can create a function to be called in place of the default toString() method. The toString() method takes no arguments and should return a string. The toString() method you create can be any value you want, but it will be most useful if it carries information about the object.

The following code defines the Dog object type and creates theDog, an object of type Dog:

function Dog(name, breed, color, sex) {
  this.name = name;
  this.breed = breed;
  this.color = color;
  this.sex = sex;
}

theDog = new Dog('Gabby', 'Lab', 'chocolate', 'female');

If you call the toString() method on this custom object, it returns the default value inherited from Object:

theDog.toString(); // returns [object Object]

The following code creates and assigns dogToString() to override the default toString() method. This function generates a string containing the name, breed, color, and sex of the object, in the form "property = value;".

Dog.prototype.toString = function dogToString() {
  var ret = 'Dog ' + this.name + ' is a ' + this.sex + ' ' + this.color + ' ' + this.breed;
  return ret;
}

With the preceding code in place, any time theDog is used in a string context, JavaScript automatically calls the dogToString() function, which returns the following string:

"Dog Gabby is a female chocolate Lab"

Using toString() to detect object class

toString() can be used with every object and allows you to get its class. To use the Object.prototype.toString() with every object, you need to call Function.prototype.call() or Function.prototype.apply() on it, passing the object you want to inspect as the first parameter called thisArg.

var toString = Object.prototype.toString;

toString.call(new Date);    // [object Date]
toString.call(new String);  // [object String]
toString.call(Math);        // [object Math]

// Since JavaScript 1.8.5
toString.call(undefined);   // [object Undefined]
toString.call(null);        // [object Null]

Specifications

Browser compatibility

See also

• Object.prototype.toSource()
• Object.prototype.valueOf()