JSON.stringify – A versatile tool in your belt

A common scenario that we run into when writing JavaScript for the browser is showing a variable as text on the screen. JS has an inbuilt function to achieve that quite easily. Just us the toString() function. Here is an example:

var i = 10
i.toString()

"10"

Where this falls short is when the variable is an object. Trying the same:

var name = {"first": "Tom", "last": "Hardy"}
name.toString()

"[object Object]"

Here is where JSON.stringify comes in handy.

var name2 = {"first": "Tom", "last": "Hardy"}
JSON.stringify(name2)

"{"first":"Tom","last":"Hardy"}"