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<h1><a href="./">wren</a></h1>
<h2>a classy little scripting language</h2>
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<h2>Maps</h2>
<p>A map is an <em>associative</em> collection. It holds a set of entries, each of which
maps a <em>key</em> to a <em>value</em>. The same data structure has a variety of names in
other languages: hash table, dictionary, association, table, etc.</p>
<p>You can create a map by placing a series of comma-separated entries inside
curly braces. Each entry is a key and a value separated by a colon:</p>
<pre class="snippet">
{
"maple": "Sugar Maple (Acer Saccharum)",
"larch": "Alpine Larch (Larix Lyallii)",
"oak": "Red Oak (Quercus Rubra)",
"fir": "Fraser Fir (Abies Fraseri)"
}
</pre>
<p>This creates a map that associates a type of tree (key) to a specific
tree within that family (value). Syntactically, in a map literal, keys
can be any literal, a variable name, or a parenthesized expression.
Values can be any expression. Here, we&rsquo;re using string literals for both keys
and values.</p>
<p><em>Semantically</em>, values can be any object, and multiple keys may map to the same
value. </p>
<p>Keys have a few limitations. They must be one of the immutable built-in
<a href="values.html">value types</a> in Wren. That means a number, string, range, bool, or <code>null</code>.
You can also use a <a href="classes.html">class object</a> as a key (not an instance of that class,
the actual class itself).</p>
<p>The reason for this limitation&mdash;and the reason maps are called &ldquo;<em>hash</em>
tables&rdquo; in other languages&mdash;is that each key is used to generate a numeric
<em>hash code</em>. This lets a map locate the value associated with a key in constant
time, even in very large maps. Since Wren only knows how to hash certain
built-in types, only those can be used as keys.</p>
<h2>Adding entries <a href="#adding-entries" name="adding-entries" class="header-anchor">#</a></h2>
<p>You add new key-value pairs to the map using the <a href="method-calls.html#subscripts">subscript operator</a>:</p>
<pre class="snippet">
var capitals = {}
capitals["Georgia"] = "Atlanta"
capitals["Idaho"] = "Boise"
capitals["Maine"] = "Augusta"
</pre>
<p>If the key isn&rsquo;t already present, this adds it and associates it with the given
value. If the key is already there, this just replaces its value.</p>
<h2>Looking up values <a href="#looking-up-values" name="looking-up-values" class="header-anchor">#</a></h2>
<p>To find the value associated with some key, again you use your friend the
subscript operator:</p>
<pre class="snippet">
System.print(capitals["Idaho"]) //> Boise
</pre>
<p>If the key is present, this returns its value. Otherwise, it returns <code>null</code>. Of
course, <code>null</code> itself can also be used as a value, so seeing <code>null</code> here
doesn&rsquo;t necessarily mean the key wasn&rsquo;t found.</p>
<p>To tell definitively if a key exists, you can call <code>containsKey()</code>:</p>
<pre class="snippet">
var capitals = {"Georgia": null}
System.print(capitals["Georgia"]) //> null (though key exists)
System.print(capitals["Idaho"]) //> null
System.print(capitals.containsKey("Georgia")) //> true
System.print(capitals.containsKey("Idaho")) //> false
</pre>
<p>You can see how many entries a map contains using <code>count</code>:</p>
<pre class="snippet">
System.print(capitals.count) //> 3
</pre>
<h2>Removing entries <a href="#removing-entries" name="removing-entries" class="header-anchor">#</a></h2>
<p>To remove an entry from a map, call <code>remove()</code> and pass in the key for the
entry you want to delete:</p>
<pre class="snippet">
capitals.remove("Maine")
System.print(capitals.containsKey("Maine")) //> false
</pre>
<p>If the key was found, this returns the value that was associated with it:</p>
<pre class="snippet">
System.print(capitals.remove("Georgia")) //> Atlanta
</pre>
<p>If the key wasn&rsquo;t in the map to begin with, <code>remove()</code> just returns <code>null</code>.</p>
<p>If you want to remove <em>everything</em> from the map, like with <a href="lists.html">lists</a>, you call
<code>clear()</code>:</p>
<pre class="snippet">
capitals.clear()
System.print(capitals.count) //> 0
</pre>
<h2>Iterating over the contents <a href="#iterating-over-the-contents" name="iterating-over-the-contents" class="header-anchor">#</a></h2>
<p>The subscript operator works well for finding values when you know the key
you&rsquo;re looking for, but sometimes you want to see everything that&rsquo;s in the map.
You can use a regular for loop to iterate the contents, and map exposes two
additional methods to access the contents: <code>keys</code> and <code>values</code>. </p>
<p>The <code>keys</code> method on a map returns a <a href="modules/core/sequence.html">Sequence</a> that <a href="control-flow.html#the-iterator-protocol">iterates</a> over all of
the keys in the map, and the <code>values</code> method returns one that iterates over the values.</p>
<p>Regardless of how you iterate, the <em>order</em> that things are iterated in
isn&rsquo;t defined. Wren makes no promises about what order keys and values are
iterated. All it promises is that every entry will appear exactly once.</p>
<p><strong>Iterating with for(entry in map)</strong> <br />
When you iterate a map with <code>for</code>, you&rsquo;ll be handed an <em>entry</em>, which contains
a <code>key</code> and a <code>value</code> field. That gives you the info for each element in the map.</p>
<pre class="snippet">
var birds = {
"Arizona": "Cactus wren",
"Hawaii": "Nēnē",
"Ohio": "Northern Cardinal"
}
for (bird in birds) {
System.print("The state bird of %(bird.key) is %(bird.value)")
}
</pre>
<p><strong>Iterating using the keys</strong> </p>
<p>You can also iterate over the keys and use each to look up its value:</p>
<pre class="snippet">
var birds = {
"Arizona": "Cactus wren",
"Hawaii": "Nēnē",
"Ohio": "Northern Cardinal"
}
for (state in birds.keys) {
System.print("The state bird of %(state) is " + birds[state])
}
</pre>
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