Benchmark: lodash noop vs new function vs optional chaining

HTML Preparation code:


<script src='https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/lodash.js/4.17.5/lodash.min.js'></script>

Tests:

noop
var a = _.noop a()
new function
var a = () => {} a()
optional chaining
var a; a?.()

Rendered benchmark preparation results:

Suite status: <idle, ready to run>

Previous results

Test case name	Result
noop
new function
optional chaining

Fastest: N/A

Slowest: N/A

Latest run results:

Run details: (Test run date: one year ago)

User agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10_15_7) AppleWebKit/605.1.15 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/17.0 Safari/605.1.15

Browser/OS: Safari 17 on Mac OS X 10.15.7

View result in a separate tab

Test name	Executions per second
noop	16081843.0 Ops/sec
new function	137512112.0 Ops/sec
optional chaining	491706016.0 Ops/sec

Autogenerated LLM Summary (model llama3.2:3b, generated 2 months ago):

LLMs can make mistakes. Check important info.

I'd be happy to help you understand the provided JavaScript benchmark.

**What is being tested?**

The test case measures the performance of three different approaches:

1. `_.noop` (Lodash's "no operation" function): This function returns an empty function, which does nothing when called.
2. A new function created using the arrow function syntax: `() => {}`
3. Optional chaining (`?.`) with a variable `a`.

**Options compared**

The three options are compared in terms of their performance, measured by the number of executions per second.

**Pros and cons of each approach**

1. `_.noop`:
	* Pros: Simple to implement, always returns an empty function.
	* Cons: May incur overhead due to the creation of a new function object.
2. New function created using arrow function syntax (`() => {}`):
	* Pros: Lightweight, easy to read and write.
	* Cons: May require additional parsing or interpretation steps by the JavaScript engine.
3. Optional chaining (`?.`):
	* Pros: Reduces boilerplate code, makes it easier to handle null or undefined values.
	* Cons: May incur overhead due to the need for runtime checks.

**Library used**

The test case uses Lodash's `_.noop` function, which is a utility function provided by the library. The purpose of this function is to provide a simple way to create an empty function that can be used as a placeholder or a no-op operation.

**Special JavaScript feature or syntax**

The test case uses the arrow function syntax (`() => {}`) and optional chaining (`?.`). These are both modern JavaScript features introduced in ECMAScript 2015 (ES6).

Arrow functions provide a concise way to define small, single-expression functions. They are often used for short, simple functions that don't require the overhead of a traditional function declaration.

Optional chaining (`?.`) is a shorthand syntax for accessing nested properties or calling methods on an object while providing a safe way to handle null or undefined values. It allows you to use the nullish coalescing operator (`??`) in a more expressive and readable way.

**Other alternatives**

If you want to create a simple, no-op function, you could also use `function() { return; }()` or `(function() { return; })()` instead of Lodash's `_noop` function. However, these approaches require creating an entire function object, which may incur additional overhead compared to using the arrow function syntax.

If you want to perform optional chaining without relying on the `?.` operator, you could use a different approach such as checking for null or undefined values explicitly:
```javascript
var a;
if (a !== null && a !== undefined) {
  a();
}
```
However, this approach is less concise and more verbose than using the optional chaining syntax.

Related benchmarks:

lodash noop vs new function vs optional chaining (version: 0)

Comparing performance of: noop vs new function vs optional chaining

Created: one year ago by: Guest

Jump to the latest result

noop

new function

optional chaining

Suite status: <idle, ready to run>

Experimental features:

Fastest: N/A

Slowest: N/A

Autogenerated LLM Summary (model llama3.2:3b, generated 2 months ago):