helpers.arrayElements should return a tuple instead of an array

[cloud-walker]

helpers.arrayElements should return a tuple instead of an array

[cloud-walker]

oh I see, AFAIK tuple exists in TS only on the type level, so they are arrays anyway

[matthewmayer]

faker.helpers.arrayElements() can work with any JavaScript array though, it's not necessary typed.

[matthewmayer]

I mean tuples don't exist in JavaScript so would need to ensure this doesn't break anything for regular JavaScript arrays.

[ST-DDT]

I have a rough estimate on what you are asking, I'm just now sure how to properly model it with TS.
Especially in combination with the dynamic length ranges.
Could you please explain how you would handle that?

Also could you explain why you want this change? As that helps us understand your request better.

[cloud-walker]

Hi @ST-DDT the TS in this case is not the easiest in my experience, I've already done experiments on my codebase, and the problem to solve is similar to the one solved on remeda codebase for the hasAtLeast function.

In our case the count maybe undefined or number or {min: number; max: number} so it's a bit more challenging.

Also could you explain why you want this change? As that helps us understand your request better.

Using the noUncheckedIndexedAccess option the destructuring of the array generated by arrayElements becomes less ergonomic as the elements would be of type T | undefined

import {faker} from '@faker-js/faker'

const langsPool = ['en', 'it', 'fr', 'es'] as const

const [langA, langB] = faker.arrayElements(langsPool, 2)

// referencing langA and langB later on is not safe when in reality it should be

[ST-DDT]

We could limit the feature to fixed size arrays at first, so we split the method into separate signatures and add the feature only to one of them.

[ST-DDT]

One of the problems I see is that removing elements from the resulting array invalidates it's type then.

[cloud-walker]

I think that the helpers can continue to be dynamic as it is, we just need to handle a more complex type signature, I can try to make a PR, the same stuff apply to other helpers, like:

1. multiple()
2. uniqueArray()

I can obviously start small experimenting with arrayElements first

[cloud-walker]

@matthewmayer what do you mean? Of course it works with any array 🤔