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Javascript

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5 views

Javascript

Uploaded by

mayuri.softwaredeveloper
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Logical OR (||)

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The logical OR (||) (logical disjunction) operator for a set of operands is true if and
only if one or more of its operands is true. It is typically used with boolean (logical)
values. When it is, it returns a Boolean value. However, the || operator actually returns
the value of one of the specified operands, so if this operator is used with non-Boolean
values, it will return a non-Boolean value.

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Syntax
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x || y

Description
If x can be converted to true, returns x; else, returns y.

If a value can be converted to true, the value is so-called truthy. If a value can be
converted to false, the value is so-called falsy.

Examples of expressions that can be converted to false are:

 null;
 NaN;
 0;
 empty string ("" or '' or ``);
 undefined.

Even though the || operator can be used with operands that are not Boolean values, it
can still be considered a boolean operator since its return value can always be
converted to a boolean primitive. To explicitly convert its return value (or any
expression in general) to the corresponding boolean value, use a double NOT
operator or the Boolean() constructor.

Short-circuit evaluation

The logical OR expression is evaluated left to right, it is tested for possible "short-
circuit" evaluation using the following rule:

(some truthy expression) || expr is short-circuit evaluated to the truthy expression.


Short circuit means that the expr part above is not evaluated, hence any side effects
of doing so do not take effect (e.g., if expr is a function call, the calling never takes
place). This happens because the value of the operator is already determined after the
evaluation of the first operand. See example:

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function A() {
console.log("called A");
return false;}function B() {
console.log("called B");
return true;}

console.log(B()|| A());// Logs "called B" due to the function call,// then
logs true (which is the resulting value of the operator)

Operator precedence

The following expressions might seem equivalent, but they are not, because
the && operator is executed before the || operator (see operator precedence).

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true || false && false; // returns true, because && is executed
first(true || false) && false; // returns false, because grouping has the
highest precedence

Examples
Using OR

The following code shows examples of the || (logical OR) operator.

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true || true; // t || t returns truefalse || true; // f || t returns truetrue ||
false; // t || f returns truefalse || 3 === 4; // f || f returns false"Cat" ||
"Dog"; // t || t returns "Cat"false || "Cat"; // f || t returns "Cat""Cat" ||
false; // t || f returns "Cat""" || false; // f || f returns falsefalse || ""; // f
|| f returns ""false || varObject; // f || object returns varObject
Note: If you use this operator to provide a default value to some
variable, be aware that any falsy value will not be used. If you only
need to filter out null or undefined, consider using the nullish
coalescing operator.

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