π Understanding JavaScript Hoisting π
Hoisting refers to the process where JavaScript moves declarations to the top of their respective scope during the compilation phase before the actual code execution.
Remember that JavaScript only hoists declarations, not initialization.
Consider the following code snippet:
console.log(myVariable);
var myVariable = 10;
You might expect this code to throw an error because myVariable
is being used before it's assigned a value. However, JavaScript behaves differently due to hoisting. During compilation, the code is effectively interpreted as:
var myVariable;
console.log(myVariable); // undefined
myVariable = 10;
As we can see, the declaration myVariable
is "hoisted" to the top, but the initialization remains in the same place. This means that when we log myVariable
before assigning it a value, it's not an error; instead, it results in undefined
.
Let vs Var
An important distinction to make is that let
and const
declarations are also hoisted, but they differ from var
in one significant way. Variables declared with let
or const
are not initialized until their actual position in the code is reached. This is known as the "temporal dead zone."
console.log(myVar); // undefined
var myVar = 5;
console.log(myLet); // ReferenceError: Cannot access 'myLet' before initialization
let myLet = 10;
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