Filtering Array and Getting the Index of an Element in jQuery

Consider an example of getting unique elements from an array a = [1,1,2,3,8,2].

Array.prototype.unique = function(){
    var array = this;
    return array.filter(function(ele, index, arr){
        return index == arr.indexOf(ele);
    });
}

and in our JavaScript:

var array = [1,1,2,3,8,2];
var uniqueElments = array.unique();

//Output will be 1,2,3,8

But the issue is few of the older version browsers including Internet Explorer 7 that don't support some array features - such as indexOf or filter, so we can use jQuery functionalities like:

• $.grep instead of Array.filter
• The $.grep() method removes items from an array as necessary so that all remaining items pass a provided test. The test is a function that is passed an array item and the index of the item within the array. Only if the test returns true will the item be in the result array.

• $.inArray instead of Array.indexOf
• The $.inArray() method is similar to JavaScript's native .indexOf() method in that it returns -1 when it doesn't find a match. If the first element within the array matches value, $.inArray() returns 0.

Now here's how the changed code would look like:

Array.prototype.unique = function(){
    var array = this;
    return $.grep(array, function(ele, index){
            return $.inArray(ele, array) === index;
    });
}

References

• $.grep
• $.inArray