What Does EventEmitter.call() Do?

I saw this code sample: function Dog(name) { this.name = name; EventEmitter.call(this); } it 'inherits' from EventEmitter, but what does the call() method actually do?

Solution 1:

Basically, Dog is supposedly a constructor with a property name. The EventEmitter.call(this), when executed during Dog instance creation, appends properties declared from the EventEmitter constructor to Dog.

Remember: constructors are still functions, and can still be used as functions.

//An example EventEmitter
function EventEmitter(){
  //for example, if EventEmitter had these properties
  //when EventEmitter.call(this) is executed in the Dog constructor
  //it basically passes the new instance of Dog into this function as "this"
  //where here, it appends properties to it
  this.foo = 'foo';
  this.bar = 'bar';
}

//And your constructor Dog
function Dog(name) {
    this.name = name;
    //during instance creation, this line calls the EventEmitter function
    //and passes "this" from this scope, which is your new instance of Dog
    //as "this" in the EventEmitter constructor
    EventEmitter.call(this);
}

//create Dog
var newDog = new Dog('furball');
//the name, from the Dog constructor
newDog.name; //furball
//foo and bar, which were appended to the instance by calling EventEmitter.call(this)
newDog.foo; //foo
newDoc.bar; //bar

Solution 2:

EventEmitter.call(this);

This line is roughly equivalent to calling super() in languages with classical inheritance.