I would like to create a custom event emitter in my client-side programs. I am referencing this (sparse) documentation for EventTarget
My implementation attempt
var Emitter = function Emitter() {
EventTarget.call(this);
};
Emitter.prototype = Object.create(EventTarget.prototype, {
constructor: {
value: Emitter
}
});
My desired usage
var e = new Emitter();
e.addEventListener("hello", function() {
console.log("hello there!");
});
e.dispatchEvent(new Event("hello"));
// "hello there!"
Where it fails
var e = new Emitter();
// TypeError: Illegal constructor
What am I doing wrong?
Update
The following is possible, but it's a hack that depends on a dummy DOMElement
var fake = document.createElement("phony");
fake.addEventListener("hello", function() { console.log("hello there!"); });
fake.dispatchEvent(new Event("hello"));
// "hello there!"
I'd like to know how to do this without having to use the dummy element
I gave up on this awhile ago, but recently needed it again. Here's what I ended up using.
ES6
class Emitter {
constructor() {
var delegate = document.createDocumentFragment();
[
'addEventListener',
'dispatchEvent',
'removeEventListener'
].forEach(f =>
this[f] = (...xs) => delegate[f](...xs)
)
}
}
// sample class to use Emitter
class Example extends Emitter {}
// run it
var e = new Example()
e.addEventListener('something', event => console.log(event))
e.dispatchEvent(new Event('something'))
ES5
function Emitter() {
var eventTarget = document.createDocumentFragment()
function delegate(method) {
this[method] = eventTarget[method].bind(eventTarget)
}
[
"addEventListener",
"dispatchEvent",
"removeEventListener"
].forEach(delegate, this)
}
// sample class to use it
function Example() {
Emitter.call(this)
}
// run it
var e = new Example()
e.addEventListener("something", function(event) {
console.log(event)
})
e.dispatchEvent(new Event("something"))
Yeah!
For those that need to support older versions of ecmascript, here you go
// IE < 9 compatible
function Emitter() {
var eventTarget = document.createDocumentFragment();
function addEventListener(type, listener, useCapture, wantsUntrusted) {
return eventTarget.addEventListener(type, listener, useCapture, wantsUntrusted);
}
function dispatchEvent(event) {
return eventTarget.dispatchEvent(event);
}
function removeEventListener(type, listener, useCapture) {
return eventTarget.removeEventListener(type, listener, useCapture);
}
this.addEventListener = addEventListener;
this.dispatchEvent = dispatchEvent;
this.removeEventListener = removeEventListener;
}
The usage stays the same