svelte-keyed

A writable derived store for objects and arrays!

const user = writable({ name: { first: 'Rich', last: 'Harris' } });
const firstName = keyed(user, 'name.first');

$firstName = 'Bryan';

console.log($user); // { name: { first: 'Bryan', last: 'Harris' } };

Installation

$ npm i -D svelte-keyed

Since Svelte automatically bundles all required dependencies, you only need to install this package as a dev dependency with the -D flag.

API

keyed takes a writable object store and a keypath, and returns a writable store whose changes are reflected on the original store.

Properties are accessed with dot notation, and arrays can be indexed with bracket notation.

const email = keyed(settings, 'profiles[0].email');

Nullable parents

If the parent store is nullable, then the child store will also be nullable.

type User = {
  name: {
    first: string;
    last: string;
  };
  relations: {
    partner?: User;
  };
};

const maybeUser = writable<User | undefined>(undefined);
// Writable<string | undefined>
const firstName = keyed(maybeUser, 'name.first');

Nullable properties

Nullable properties are accessed with optional chaining behaviour.

const user = writable(initUser);
// Writable<Name | undefined>
const partnerName = keyed(user, 'relations.partner.name');

TypeScript

keyed infers the return type of the keyed store from the keypath.

const user = writable(initUser);
// Writable<string>
const firstName = keyed(user, 'name.first');

keyed will also try to guess all possible keypaths up to a depth limit of 3.

keyed(user, '...');
            ┌───────────────────────────────┐
            │ • name                        │
            │ • name.first                  │
            │ • name.last                   │
            │ • relations                   │
            │ • relations.partner           │
            │ • relations.partner.name      │
            └───────────────────────────────┘

This limit is due to a TypeScript limitation where structured types must be generated statically. Increasing the depth limit slows down type compilation.

Type hints will not be provided for keypaths with a depth greater than 3 but this does not affect the return type.

const user = writable(user);
// Writable<string | undefined>
const firstName = keyed(user, 'relations.partner.name.first');

Motivations

We usually read and write properties of an object store with auto-subscriptions.

<input bind:value={$name.first}/>

However, auto-subscriptions are isolated to a Svelte component. svelte-keyed aims to solve several common limitations listed below.

Context stores

Often, we want to set a property or element of a store into component context, then allow child components to read / write to the property.

<!-- Settings.svelte -->
<script>
  setContext('profileSettings', keyed(settings, 'profile'));
</script>

<GeneralSettings />
<ProfileSettings />

<!-- ProfileSettings.svelte -->
<script>
  const profileSettings = getContext('profileSettings');
</script>

<input type="text" bind:value={$profileSettings.username} />

Helper functions

One important method to reduce clutter on your component is to extract functionality into external helper functions. svelte-keyed allows you to create derived Writable stores that can be passed into or returned from helper functions.

<!-- Settings.svelte -->
<script>
  const stats = writable({ userClicks: 0, userTaps: 0 });
  const clicks = keyed(stats, 'userClicks');
</script>

<div use:trackClicks={clicks} />
<input use:trackClicks={clicks} />

export const trackClicks = (node, clicks) => {
  const listen = () => {
    clicks.update(($clicks) => $clicks + 1);
  };
  node.addEventListener('click', listen);
  return {
    destroy() {
      node.removeEventListener('click', listen);
    },
  };
};