Generators can yield multiple values on-demand. They work great with iterables and allow for creating data streams with ease.
To create a generator, we need a special syntax construct: function* funcName(), called a generator function. There are a number of ways to “pull” values out of the generator function, including a for in loop or calling next() on the generator function return value.
Example
function* myGenerator() {
for (let i = 0; i < 3; i++) {
console.log(`generator: ${i}`);
yield i;
}
}
let gen = myGenerator();
for (let i of gen) {
console.log(`first for loop: ${i}`);
}
/*
generator: 0
first for loop: 0
generator: 1
first for loop: 1
generator: 2
first for loop: 2
*/
// generator results cannot be re-used, so this will print nothing
for (let i of gen) {
console.log(`second for loop: ${i}`);
}
// alternative way to step through generator yields
let gen2 = myGenerator();
console.log(gen2.next());
console.log(gen2.next());
console.log(gen2.next());
console.log(gen2.next());
/*
generator: 0
{value: 0, done: false}
generator: 1
{value: 1, done: false}
generator: 2
{value: 2, done: false}
{value: undefined, done: true}
*/