Making Code More Reusable with the this Keyword

• The last post introduced a method to the dog object. It used dog.name dot notation to access the value for the name property within the return statement:

sayName: function() {return "The name of this dog is " + dog.name + ".";}

• While this is a valid way to access the object's property, there is a pitfall here. If the variable name changes, any code referencing the original name would need to be updated as well. In a short object definition, it isn't a problem, but if an object has many references to its properties there is a greater chance for error.

• A way to avoid these issues is with the this keyword:
  

let dog = {
  name: "Anakin",
  numLegs: 4,
  sayName: function() {return "The name of this dog is " + this.name + ".";}
};

dog.sayLegs();

• this is a deep topic, and the above example is only one way to use it. In the current context, this refers to the object that the method is associated with: dog. If the object's name is changed to husky, it is not necessary to find all the references to dog in the code. It makes the code reusable and easier to read.