Method Chaining
The %Set(), and %Push() methods return a reference to the entity that they have modified. The returned reference can immediately be used to call another method on the same entity, within the same expression.
The dynamic entity that begins a chain can be either a constructor ({}, or []) or an existing entity. Methods %Set() and %Push() return chainable references and can be called from anywhere in the chain. The last item in a chain can be any method available to the entity.
In the following example, a single write statement uses chained calls to %FromJSON(), %Set(), %Push(), and %ToJSON() to create, modify, and display a dynamic array:
set jstring = "[123]"
write [].%FromJSON(jstring).%Set(1,"one").%Push("two").%Push("three").%Set(1,"final value").%ToJSON()
[123,"final value","two","three"]
%FromJSON() is only useful as the first method call in a chain, since it does not return a modified version of the calling entity. Instead, it simply ignores the calling entity and returns an entirely new instance deserialized from a JSON string. For more information, see “Converting Dynamic Entities to and from JSON”.
You could also start a chain by retrieving a nested entity with %Get(), %Pop(), %GetNext(), or %Remove().
