a JS newbie question about logical operators

Community Help
1

Hi Community!

I’ve read the MDN web docs on logical operators
 as well as several other online resources, but I am still wrestling with this one…

I am trying to filter through a list of cases to figure out which ones were active during this financial year… but I keep failing. Specifically, I’d like to use the following logic:

  1. If a case came into the system after X date, and it’s still open, add it to the list.
  2. If a case came in to the system after X date, and closed before Y date, add it to the list
  3. Forget everything else.

I’ve tried this:

cases_handled_fy19 = case_data.filter(function(case_data) {
  return Date.parse(case_data.closure_date) < case_data.case_status == "Open" ||
         Date.parse(case_data.closure_date) > Date.parse(2018, 6, 30) &&
         Date.parse(case_data.closure_date) < Date.parse(2019, 7, 1)
})

… but the result is incorrect.

Narrowing it down:

cases_handled_fy19_alt2 = case_data.filter(function(case_data) {
  return Date.parse(case_data.closure_date) < Date.parse(2019, 6, 1) && case_data.case_status == "Open"
})

… returns 0 objects, yet I know that the data has open cases that were received before July 01, 2019

Here’s a link:

Would someone be willing to help me understand how to write this function? I appreciate this might be the wrong place to ask (is it’s not an observable-specific question). Please forgive (or kindly reprimand me for future reference).

Thank you!!

1 Like
2

I think the following explains the result of your “narrowed-down” query: the data objects in your array which have case_status equal to "Open" have their closure_date fields equal to "open", not a date:

case_data.filter(d => d.case_status == "Open").map(d => d.closure_date)
2 Likes
3

Thanks Bryan. Turns out that I was chasing down the wrong rabbit hole!

In sum: My attempted filtering didn’t work not because the formula was off, but because I was pointing it to an incorrect place (closure date rather than to ask - if received before this date).

I’ll should try to work harder at a solution. I do appreciate being able to ask questions when I get stuck. Thank you for always being so fast and generous with your help!

4

No problem Aaron! Getting filter functions right can be tricky… it feels like it always takes me a few tries. Fortunately, Observable makes it easy to quickly inspect the data when something doesn’t go as expected.

1 Like