When Should I Use Curly Braces For Es6 Import

Curly braces in ES6 imports can sometimes be confusing, but fear not! Understanding when to use curly braces will make your code clearer and more organized. Let's delve into this topic and shed light on the situations where using curly braces is necessary when importing ES6 modules.

When you're working with ES6 imports, the default export is declared using the "export default" syntax in the exporting file. When you import this default export in the importing file, you do not need to use curly braces. For example, if you have a utility function exported as the default export from a file called "utils.js", you would import it in another file like this:

import myUtilityFunction from './utils.js';

In this case, there are no curly braces around "myUtilityFunction" because it is the default export from 'utils.js'.

However, things are slightly different when you have named exports in the exporting file. Named exports allow you to export multiple functions, variables, or constants from a single file. When you want to import these named exports into another file, you need to use curly braces to specify which exports you want to import. Let's look at an example to clarify this:

Assume you have the following named exports in a file called "helpers.js":

export const calculateSum = (a, b) => a + b;
export const calculateProduct = (a, b) => a * b;

If you want to import and use the "calculateSum" function in another file, you would do it like this:

import { calculateSum } from './helpers.js';

Since "calculateSum" is a named export from 'helpers.js', you enclose it in curly braces while importing.

But what if you want to import multiple named exports from the same file? You can do that by separating each named export with a comma inside the curly braces. Here's an example to illustrate this scenario:

import { calculateSum, calculateProduct } from './helpers.js';

In this case, you import both the "calculateSum" and "calculateProduct" functions from 'helpers.js' by using curly braces and separating them with a comma.

So, in summary, you use curly braces when importing named exports and omit them when importing the default export. Curly braces help you explicitly specify which variables, functions, or constants you are importing, making your code more readable and maintainable.

By understanding when to use curly braces for ES6 imports, you can optimize your code structure and improve its clarity. Happy coding!