Currently, I am dealing with a Playlist object that comes with various properties to define itself, along with a collection of PlaylistItems.
Upon receiving data from the server, the JSON response is processed in the client-side success method:
success: function (data) {
console.log("JSON data:", data);
playlists = _.map(data, function (playlistConfig) {
return new Playlist(playlistConfig);
});
...
}
During this process, the JSON data is transformed into Playlist objects, where each Playlist object serves as a Backbone.Model.
This is how the data structure looks:
And this is the structure of the Playlist constructor:
return function(config) {
var playlist = new Playlist(config);
return playlist;
};
var Playlist = Backbone.Model.extend({
defaults: function() {
return {
id: null,
userId: null,
title: 'New Playlist',
selected: false,
position: 0,
shuffledItems: [],
history: [],
items: Backbone.Collection.extend({
model: PlaylistItem
})
};
},
...
}
The issue I am facing:
Upon creating a Playlist object with defaults, it initializes with an empty Backbone.Collection for PlaylistItems. However, if a Playlist object is created with an existing collection, it defaults to a basic array instead of a Backbone.Collection. This occurs due to the JSON data from the server not being converted to Backbone entities yet. The data extends beyond the Playlist's defaults and replaces the intended Backbone.Collection entity.
What would be the correct approach to initializing with a populated Backbone.Collection? One solution could involve implementing code in the initialization process to verify the type of the items array. If it is not a Backbone.Collection, create a new Backbone.Collection, add the items to it, and then replace the old array with the new collection. However, this method may seem somewhat cumbersome.