javascript working with primitive types

Within JavaScript, there's a concept of a primitive value or a primitive data type. You may have heard or might hear that everything in JavaScript is an object. As we look at these primitive values, we can see that this is not true. There are in fact seven current types within JavaScript that are definitely not objects.

typeof operator

// output of log shown as comment
console.log(typeof 'hello world') // string
console.log(typeof 1) // number
console.log(typeof false) // boolean
console.log(typeof 42n) // bigint
console.log(typeof Symbol()) // symbol
console.log(typeof null) // object
console.log(typeof undefined) // undefined

The difference between primitive types and Arrays or Objects is that they can't be mutated. The are immutable.

Primitive types don't have methods or properties on them either, they are not objects. They are the lowest level implementation in JavaScript.

So why can we use methods on primitive types like string.toUpperCase?

The typeof operator in JavaScript evaluates a statement to it's right and tells you what the type of that statement is. It will be a primitive or an object.

"Hello World" is a string 1 is a number false is a boolean 42n is how we define bigint in JavaScript.

There's also another literal form for creating a symbol in JavaScript so you use Symbol() which is it's constructor.

Because of a bug that hasn't been fixed in JavaScript early on, null will show as an object when passed in to the typeof operator.

undefined is the seventh and final primitive type.

Primitive types are treated differently than objects. First we'll see how an object can be successfully mutated.

Mutate an Object

let obj = { a : 1}

function addTwo(obj) {
  obj.a = 2
}

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