Question

So, I’m trying to have same data plotted based on a drop down filter, but I haven’t gotten past the storing the data to the variable passing to the plotting function. my alert gives object Object, but shouldn’t it be totalValue (for this example)?

the html

   <select id="performance_chart_filter">
  <option value="totalValue">Total by Value</option>
  <option value="openValue">Open by Value</option>
  <option value="declinedValue">Declined by Value</option>
  <option value="acceptedValue">Accepted by Value</option>
</select>

the javascript

$j("#performance_chart_filter").change(function(){
    plotWithChoice();
});



function plotWithChoice() {
   var d = {
        "totalValue": {
            label: "Total",
            clickable: true,
            hoverable: true,
            data: <%= @total %>
        }
.
.
.
};

    var filter = $j("#performance_chart_filter");
    var data = [d[filter.val()]];
alert(data);

Answer 1

No. filter.val() would most likely be the string "totalValue".

d[filter.val()] (or d["totalValue"]) would be the value of the property totalValue of the object d, which is an object thus the output Object object of the alert, because that’s the default string representation of a generic object like this.

And [d[filter.val()]] is a Array with one element namely the object mentioned above.

To debug this, I’d suggest you use a Debugger (such as Firebug), because that can display objects in a readable form.

Or use the .toSource() method:

alert(data.toSource());