How do you find out the caller function in JavaScript

Question

function main        Hello       function Hello          How do you find out the caller function is  main       Is there a way to find out the call stack

User · Accepted Answer

function Hello         alert  caller is     Hello caller       Note that this feature is non-standard  from Function caller      Non-standard   This feature is non-standard and is not on a standards track  Do not use it on production sites facing the Web  it will not work for every user  There may also be large incompatibilities between implementations and the behavior may change in the future      The following is the old answer from 2008  which is no longer supported in modern Javascript   function Hello         alert  caller is     arguments callee caller toString

User · Answer

heystewart s answer and JiarongWu s answer both mentioned that the Error object has access to the stack  Here s an example   x000D   x000D  function main       Hello       function Hello       var stack   new Error   stack       N B  stack      Error n  at Hello     n  at main      n        var m   stack match     Hello    n      n      if  m        var caller name   m 1       console log  Caller is    caller name         main    x000D   x000D   x000D   Different browsers shows the stack in different string formats  Safari    Caller is  main https   stacksnippets net js 14 8 Firefox   Caller is  main https   stacksnippets net js 14 3 Chrome    Caller is      at main  https   stacksnippets net js 14 3  IE Edge   Caller is     at main  https   stacksnippets net js 14 3  IE        Caller is     at main  https   stacksnippets net js 14 3   Most browsers will set the stack with var stack    new Error    stack  In Internet Explorer the stack will be undefined - you have to throw a real exception to retrieve the stack  Conclusion  It s possible to determine  quot main quot  is the caller to  quot Hello quot  using the  stack in the Error object  In fact it will work in cases where the callee   caller approach doesn t work  It will also show you context  i e  source file and line number  However effort is required to make the solution cross platform

User · Answer

If you are not going to run it in IE  lt  11 then console trace   would suit   function main         Hello       function Hello         console trace      main      Hello   VM261 9    main   VM261 4

User · Answer

In both ES6 and Strict mode  use the following to get the Caller function console log  new Error    stack split  quot  n quot   2  trim   split  quot   quot   1    Please note that  the above line will throw an exception  if there is no caller or no previous stack  Use accordingly  To get callee  the current function name   use  console log  new Error    stack split  quot  n quot   1  trim   split  quot   quot   1

User · Answer

To recap  and make it clearer       this code    function Hello         alert  caller is     arguments callee caller toString         is equivalent to this    function Hello         alert  caller is     Hello caller toString         Clearly the first bit is more portable  since you can change the name of the function  say from  Hello  to  Ciao   and still get the whole thing to work   In the latter  in case you decide to refactor the name of the invoked function  Hello   you would have to change all its occurrences

User · Answer

Just console log your error stack  You can then know how are you being called   x000D   x000D  const hello        gt    x000D    console log new Error  I was called   stack  x000D    x000D   x000D  const sello        gt    x000D    hello   x000D    x000D   x000D  sello   x000D   x000D   x000D

User · Answer

function Hello         alert Hello caller

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here is a function to get full stacktrace   function stacktrace     var f   stacktrace  var stack    Stack trace    while  f      stack      n    f name    f   f caller    return stack

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Looks like this is quite a solved question but I recently found out that callee is not allowed in  strict mode  so for my own use I wrote a class that will get the path from where it is called  It s part of a small helper lib and if you want to use the code standalone change the offset used to return the stack trace of the caller  use 1 instead of 2   function ScriptPath       var scriptPath         try         Throw an error to generate a stack trace     throw new Error          catch e          Split the stack trace into each line     var stackLines   e stack split   n        var callerIndex   0        Now walk though each line until we find a path reference     for var i in stackLines         if  stackLines i  match  http s           continue          We skipped all the lines with out an http so we now have a script reference         This one is the class constructor  the next is the getScriptPath   call         The one after that is the user code requesting the path info  so offset by 2        callerIndex   Number i    2        break              Now parse the string for each section we want to return     pathParts   stackLines callerIndex  match    http s                     js              this fullPath   function         return pathParts 1           this path   function         return pathParts 2           this file   function         return pathParts 3           this fileNoExt   function         var parts   this file   split           parts length   parts length    1   parts length - 1   1      return parts join

User · Answer

Just console log your error stack  You can then know how are you being called   x000D   x000D  const hello        gt    x000D    console log new Error  I was called   stack  x000D    x000D   x000D  const sello        gt    x000D    hello   x000D    x000D   x000D  sello   x000D   x000D   x000D

User · Answer

Why all of the solutions above look like a rocket science  Meanwhile  it should not be more complicated than this snippet  All credits to this guy   How do you find out the caller function in JavaScript   var stackTrace   function          var calls           var caller   arguments callee caller       for  var k   0  k  lt  10  k              if  caller                calls push caller               caller   caller caller                       return calls         when I call this inside specific method I see list of references to source method  obviously  I can add toString   to each call to see only function s content     function    function data   function res   function l   function a  c   x a  b  c  d   function c  e

User · Answer

Try the following code   function getStackTrace      var f   arguments callee    var ret         var item         var iter   0     while   f   f caller             Initialize     item           name  f name    null        args         Empty array   no arguments passed       callback  f                  Function arguments     if   f arguments          for   iter   0  iter lt f arguments length  iter              item args iter    f arguments iter                 else         item args   null     null   argument listing not supported            ret push  item          return ret      Worked for me in Firefox-21 and Chromium-25

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As none of previous answers works like what I was looking for getting just the last function caller not a function as a string or callstack  I post my solution here for those who are like me and hope this will work for them    x000D   x000D  function getCallerName func  x000D    x000D    if   func  return  anonymous   x000D    let caller   func caller  x000D    if   caller  return  anonymous   x000D    caller   caller toString    x000D    if   caller trim   startsWith  function    return  anonymous   x000D    return caller substring 0  caller indexOf       replace  function       x000D    x000D   x000D   x000D      Example of how to use  getCallerName  function x000D   x000D  function Hello    x000D  console log  ex1    gt       getCallerName Hello    x000D    x000D   x000D  function Main    x000D  Hello    x000D   x000D     another example x000D  console log  ex3    gt       getCallerName Main    x000D    x000D   x000D  Main    x000D   x000D   x000D

User · Answer

2018 Update  caller is forbidden in strict mode  Here is an alternative using the  non-standard  Error stack   The following function seems to do the job in Firefox 52 and Chrome 61-71 though its implementation makes a lot of assumptions about the logging format of the two browsers and should be used with caution  given that it throws an exception and possibly executes two regex matchings before being done    x000D   x000D   use strict   x000D  const fnNameMatcher             at              x000D   x000D  function fnName str    x000D    const regexResult   fnNameMatcher exec str   x000D    return regexResult 1     regexResult 2   x000D    x000D   x000D  function log    messages    x000D    const logLines    new Error   stack  split   n    x000D    const callerName   fnName logLines 1    x000D   x000D    if  callerName     null    x000D      if  callerName      log     x000D        console log callerName   called log with       messages   x000D        else   x000D        console log fnName logLines 2     called log with       messages   x000D        x000D      else   x000D      console log    messages   x000D      x000D    x000D   x000D  function foo     x000D    log  hi    there    x000D    x000D   x000D   function main     x000D    foo    x000D        x000D   x000D   x000D

User · Answer

If you just want the function name and not the code  and want a browser-independent solution  use the following   var callerFunction   arguments callee caller toString   match  function            1     Note that the above will return an error if there is no caller function as there is no  1  element in the array  To work around  use the below   var callerFunction    arguments callee caller toString   match  function                null     Document Object Model   arguments callee caller toString   match  function            1   arguments callee toString   match  function            1

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I m attempting to address both the question and the current bounty with this question   The bounty requires that the caller be obtained in strict mode  and the only way I can see this done is by referring to a function declared outside of strict mode   For example  the following is non-standard but has been tested with previous  29 03 2016  and current  1st August 2018  versions of Chrome  Edge and Firefox    x000D   x000D  function caller   x000D    x000D     return caller caller caller  x000D    x000D   x000D   use strict   x000D  function main   x000D    x000D        Original question  x000D     Hello    x000D        Bounty question  x000D      function     console log  Anonymous function called by     caller   name         x000D    x000D   x000D  function Hello   x000D    x000D        How do you find out the caller function is  main   x000D     console log  Hello called by     caller   name   x000D    x000D   x000D  main    x000D   x000D   x000D

User · Answer

Just want to let you know that on PhoneGap Android the name doesnt seem to be working  But arguments callee caller toString   will do the trick

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If you really need the functionality for some reason and want it to be cross-browser compatible and not worry for strict stuff and be forward compatible then pass a this reference   function main        Hello this      function Hello caller           caller will be the object that called Hello  boom like that            you can add an undefined check code if the function Hello         will be called without parameters from somewhere else

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You can get the full stacktrace   arguments callee caller arguments callee caller caller arguments callee caller caller caller   Until caller is null   Note  it cause an infinite loop on recursive functions

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Another way around this problem is to simply pass the name of the calling function as a parameter    For example   function reformatString string  callerName         if  callerName      uid             string   string toUpperCase               return string      Now  you could call the function like this   function uid        var myString    apples        reformatString myString  function name       My example uses a hard coded check of the function name  but you could easily use a switch statement or some other logic to do what you want there

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Here  everything but the functionname is stripped from caller toString    with RegExp    lt  DOCTYPE html gt   lt meta charset  UTF-8  gt   lt title gt Show the callers name lt  title gt  lt  -- This validates as html5  -- gt   lt script gt  main    function main     Hello      function Hello      var name   Hello caller toString   replace   s             s   s g        name   name replace   s g        if   typeof window name       function        alert   sorry  the type of   name   is    typeof window name      else     alert   The name of the   typeof window name    that called is   name      lt  script gt

User · Answer

StackTrace  You can find the entire stack trace using browser specific code  The good thing is someone already made it  here is the project code on GitHub   But not all the news is good    It is really slow to get the stack trace so be careful  read this for more   You will need to define function names for the stack trace to be legible  Because if you have code like this   var Klass   function kls        this Hello   function     alert printStackTrace   join   n n          new Klass   Hello      Google Chrome will alert     kls Hello       but most browsers will expect a function name just after the keyword function and will treat it as an anonymous function  An not even Chrome will be able to use the Klass name if you don t give the name kls to the function   And by the way  you can pass to the function printStackTrace the option  guess  true  but I didn t find any real improvement by doing that  Not all browsers give you the same information  That is  parameters  code column  etc      Caller Function Name  By the way  if you only want the name of the caller function  in most browsers  but not IE  you can use   arguments callee caller name   But note that this name will be the one after the function keyword   I found no way  even on Google Chrome  to get more than that without getting the code of the whole function     Caller Function Code  And summarizing the rest of the best answers  by Pablo Cabrera  nourdine  and Greg Hewgill   The only cross-browser and really safe thing you can use is   arguments callee caller toString      Which will show the code of the caller function  Sadly  that is not enough for me  and that is why I give you tips for the StackTrace and the caller function Name  although they are not cross-browser

User · Answer

In both ES6 and Strict mode  use the following to get the Caller function console log  new Error    stack split  quot  n quot   2  trim   split  quot   quot   1    Please note that  the above line will throw an exception  if there is no caller or no previous stack  Use accordingly  To get callee  the current function name   use  console log  new Error    stack split  quot  n quot   1  trim   split  quot   quot   1

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You can get the full stacktrace   arguments callee caller arguments callee caller caller arguments callee caller caller caller   Until caller is null   Note  it cause an infinite loop on recursive functions

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Try accessing this   arguments callee caller name

User · Answer

2018 Update  caller is forbidden in strict mode  Here is an alternative using the  non-standard  Error stack   The following function seems to do the job in Firefox 52 and Chrome 61-71 though its implementation makes a lot of assumptions about the logging format of the two browsers and should be used with caution  given that it throws an exception and possibly executes two regex matchings before being done    x000D   x000D   use strict   x000D  const fnNameMatcher             at              x000D   x000D  function fnName str    x000D    const regexResult   fnNameMatcher exec str   x000D    return regexResult 1     regexResult 2   x000D    x000D   x000D  function log    messages    x000D    const logLines    new Error   stack  split   n    x000D    const callerName   fnName logLines 1    x000D   x000D    if  callerName     null    x000D      if  callerName      log     x000D        console log callerName   called log with       messages   x000D        else   x000D        console log fnName logLines 2     called log with       messages   x000D        x000D      else   x000D      console log    messages   x000D      x000D    x000D   x000D  function foo     x000D    log  hi    there    x000D    x000D   x000D   function main     x000D    foo    x000D        x000D   x000D   x000D

User · Answer

It s safer to use  arguments callee caller since arguments caller is deprecated

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here is a function to get full stacktrace   function stacktrace     var f   stacktrace  var stack    Stack trace    while  f      stack      n    f name    f   f caller    return stack

User · Answer

StackTrace  You can find the entire stack trace using browser specific code  The good thing is someone already made it  here is the project code on GitHub   But not all the news is good    It is really slow to get the stack trace so be careful  read this for more   You will need to define function names for the stack trace to be legible  Because if you have code like this   var Klass   function kls        this Hello   function     alert printStackTrace   join   n n          new Klass   Hello      Google Chrome will alert     kls Hello       but most browsers will expect a function name just after the keyword function and will treat it as an anonymous function  An not even Chrome will be able to use the Klass name if you don t give the name kls to the function   And by the way  you can pass to the function printStackTrace the option  guess  true  but I didn t find any real improvement by doing that  Not all browsers give you the same information  That is  parameters  code column  etc      Caller Function Name  By the way  if you only want the name of the caller function  in most browsers  but not IE  you can use   arguments callee caller name   But note that this name will be the one after the function keyword   I found no way  even on Google Chrome  to get more than that without getting the code of the whole function     Caller Function Code  And summarizing the rest of the best answers  by Pablo Cabrera  nourdine  and Greg Hewgill   The only cross-browser and really safe thing you can use is   arguments callee caller toString      Which will show the code of the caller function  Sadly  that is not enough for me  and that is why I give you tips for the StackTrace and the caller function Name  although they are not cross-browser

User · Answer

Works great for me  and you can chose how much you want to go back in the functions  function getCaller functionBack  0        const back   functionBack   2      const stack   new Error   stack split  at         const stackIndex   stack 3   back  includes  C       3   back     4   back       const isAsync   stack stackIndex  includes  async        let result      if  isAsync        result   stack stackIndex  split      1  split      0       else       result   stack stackIndex  split      0       return result

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To recap  and make it clearer       this code    function Hello         alert  caller is     arguments callee caller toString         is equivalent to this    function Hello         alert  caller is     Hello caller toString         Clearly the first bit is more portable  since you can change the name of the function  say from  Hello  to  Ciao   and still get the whole thing to work   In the latter  in case you decide to refactor the name of the invoked function  Hello   you would have to change all its occurrences

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I think the following code piece may be helpful   window fnPureLog   function sStatement  anyVariable        if  arguments length  lt  1             throw new Error  Arguments sStatement and anyVariable are expected               if  typeof sStatement      string              throw new Error  The type of sStatement is not match  please use string              var oCallStackTrack   new Error        console log oCallStackTrack stack replace  Error    Call Stack       n    sStatement        anyVariable       Execute the code   window fnPureLog   function sStatement  anyVariable        if  arguments length  lt  1             throw new Error  Arguments sStatement and anyVariable are expected               if  typeof sStatement      string              throw new Error  The type of sStatement is not match  please use string              var oCallStackTrack   new Error        console log oCallStackTrack stack replace  Error    Call Stack       n    sStatement        anyVariable      function fnBsnCallStack1         fnPureLog  Stock Count   100     function fnBsnCallStack2         fnBsnCallStack1      fnBsnCallStack2      The log looks like this   Call Stack      at window fnPureLog   lt anonymous gt  8 27      at fnBsnCallStack1   lt anonymous gt  13 5      at fnBsnCallStack2   lt anonymous gt  17 5      at  lt anonymous gt  20 1  Stock Count  100

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If you really need the functionality for some reason and want it to be cross-browser compatible and not worry for strict stuff and be forward compatible then pass a this reference   function main        Hello this      function Hello caller           caller will be the object that called Hello  boom like that            you can add an undefined check code if the function Hello         will be called without parameters from somewhere else

User · Answer

Another way around this problem is to simply pass the name of the calling function as a parameter    For example   function reformatString string  callerName         if  callerName      uid             string   string toUpperCase               return string      Now  you could call the function like this   function uid        var myString    apples        reformatString myString  function name       My example uses a hard coded check of the function name  but you could easily use a switch statement or some other logic to do what you want there

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I know you mentioned  in Javascript   but if the purpose is debugging  I think it s easier to just use your browser s developer tools  This is how it looks in Chrome   Just drop the debugger where you want to investigate the stack

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I would do this   function Hello       console trace

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I would do this   function Hello       console trace

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Try accessing this   arguments callee caller name

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You can use Function Caller to get the calling function  The old method  using argument caller is considered obsolete   The following code illustrates its use   function Hello     return Hello caller    Hello2   function NamedFunc     return NamedFunc caller      function main        Hello       both return main      Hello2        Notes about obsolete argument caller   https   developer mozilla org en-US docs Web JavaScript Reference Functions arguments caller  Be aware Function caller is non-standard  https   developer mozilla org en-US docs Web JavaScript Reference Global Objects Function caller

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function Hello         alert Hello caller

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Note you can t use Function caller in Node js  use caller-id package instead  For example   var callerId   require  caller-id     function foo         bar      function bar         var caller   callerId getData               caller             typeName   Object           functionName   foo           filePath    path of this file js           lineNumber  5          topLevelFlag  true          nativeFlag  false          evalFlag  false

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You can use Function Caller to get the calling function  The old method  using argument caller is considered obsolete   The following code illustrates its use   function Hello     return Hello caller    Hello2   function NamedFunc     return NamedFunc caller      function main        Hello       both return main      Hello2        Notes about obsolete argument caller   https   developer mozilla org en-US docs Web JavaScript Reference Functions arguments caller  Be aware Function caller is non-standard  https   developer mozilla org en-US docs Web JavaScript Reference Global Objects Function caller

User · Answer

Try accessing this   arguments callee caller name

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Why all of the solutions above look like a rocket science  Meanwhile  it should not be more complicated than this snippet  All credits to this guy   How do you find out the caller function in JavaScript   var stackTrace   function          var calls           var caller   arguments callee caller       for  var k   0  k  lt  10  k              if  caller                calls push caller               caller   caller caller                       return calls         when I call this inside specific method I see list of references to source method  obviously  I can add toString   to each call to see only function s content     function    function data   function res   function l   function a  c   x a  b  c  d   function c  e

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It s safer to use  arguments callee caller since arguments caller is deprecated

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function Hello         alert Hello caller

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I wanted to add my fiddle here for this   http   jsfiddle net bladnman EhUm3   I tested this is chrome  safari and IE  10 and 8   Works fine  There is only 1 function that matters  so if you get scared by the big fiddle  read below   Note  There is a fair amount of my own  boilerplate  in this fiddle  You can remove all of that and use split s if you like  It s just an ultra-safe  set of functions I ve come to rely on   There is also a  JSFiddle  template in there that I use for many fiddles to simply quick fiddling

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Works great for me  and you can chose how much you want to go back in the functions  function getCaller functionBack  0        const back   functionBack   2      const stack   new Error   stack split  at         const stackIndex   stack 3   back  includes  C       3   back     4   back       const isAsync   stack stackIndex  includes  async        let result      if  isAsync        result   stack stackIndex  split      1  split      0       else       result   stack stackIndex  split      0       return result

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Note you can t use Function caller in Node js  use caller-id package instead  For example   var callerId   require  caller-id     function foo         bar      function bar         var caller   callerId getData               caller             typeName   Object           functionName   foo           filePath    path of this file js           lineNumber  5          topLevelFlag  true          nativeFlag  false          evalFlag  false

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I know you mentioned  in Javascript   but if the purpose is debugging  I think it s easier to just use your browser s developer tools  This is how it looks in Chrome   Just drop the debugger where you want to investigate the stack

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It s safer to use  arguments callee caller since arguments caller is deprecated

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As far as I know  we have 2 way for this from given sources like this-   arguments caller  function whoCalled         if  arguments caller    null         console log  I was called from the global scope         else        console log arguments caller     called me        Function caller  function myFunc        if  myFunc caller    null          return  The function was called from the top            else            return  This function  s caller was     myFunc caller             Think u have your answer

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I think the following code piece may be helpful   window fnPureLog   function sStatement  anyVariable        if  arguments length  lt  1             throw new Error  Arguments sStatement and anyVariable are expected               if  typeof sStatement      string              throw new Error  The type of sStatement is not match  please use string              var oCallStackTrack   new Error        console log oCallStackTrack stack replace  Error    Call Stack       n    sStatement        anyVariable       Execute the code   window fnPureLog   function sStatement  anyVariable        if  arguments length  lt  1             throw new Error  Arguments sStatement and anyVariable are expected               if  typeof sStatement      string              throw new Error  The type of sStatement is not match  please use string              var oCallStackTrack   new Error        console log oCallStackTrack stack replace  Error    Call Stack       n    sStatement        anyVariable      function fnBsnCallStack1         fnPureLog  Stock Count   100     function fnBsnCallStack2         fnBsnCallStack1      fnBsnCallStack2      The log looks like this   Call Stack      at window fnPureLog   lt anonymous gt  8 27      at fnBsnCallStack1   lt anonymous gt  13 5      at fnBsnCallStack2   lt anonymous gt  17 5      at  lt anonymous gt  20 1  Stock Count  100

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Try accessing this   arguments callee caller name

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I usually use  new Error    stack in Chrome   The nice thing is that this also gives you the line numbers where the caller called the function  The downside is that it limits the length of the stack to 10  which is why I came to this page in the first place    I m using this to collect callstacks in a low-level constructor during execution  to view and debug later  so setting a breakpoint isn t of use since it will be hit thousands of times

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I m attempting to address both the question and the current bounty with this question   The bounty requires that the caller be obtained in strict mode  and the only way I can see this done is by referring to a function declared outside of strict mode   For example  the following is non-standard but has been tested with previous  29 03 2016  and current  1st August 2018  versions of Chrome  Edge and Firefox    x000D   x000D  function caller   x000D    x000D     return caller caller caller  x000D    x000D   x000D   use strict   x000D  function main   x000D    x000D        Original question  x000D     Hello    x000D        Bounty question  x000D      function     console log  Anonymous function called by     caller   name         x000D    x000D   x000D  function Hello   x000D    x000D        How do you find out the caller function is  main   x000D     console log  Hello called by     caller   name   x000D    x000D   x000D  main    x000D   x000D   x000D

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Looks like this is quite a solved question but I recently found out that callee is not allowed in  strict mode  so for my own use I wrote a class that will get the path from where it is called  It s part of a small helper lib and if you want to use the code standalone change the offset used to return the stack trace of the caller  use 1 instead of 2   function ScriptPath       var scriptPath         try         Throw an error to generate a stack trace     throw new Error          catch e          Split the stack trace into each line     var stackLines   e stack split   n        var callerIndex   0        Now walk though each line until we find a path reference     for var i in stackLines         if  stackLines i  match  http s           continue          We skipped all the lines with out an http so we now have a script reference         This one is the class constructor  the next is the getScriptPath   call         The one after that is the user code requesting the path info  so offset by 2        callerIndex   Number i    2        break              Now parse the string for each section we want to return     pathParts   stackLines callerIndex  match    http s                     js              this fullPath   function         return pathParts 1           this path   function         return pathParts 2           this file   function         return pathParts 3           this fileNoExt   function         var parts   this file   split           parts length   parts length    1   parts length - 1   1      return parts join

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I usually use  new Error    stack in Chrome   The nice thing is that this also gives you the line numbers where the caller called the function  The downside is that it limits the length of the stack to 10  which is why I came to this page in the first place    I m using this to collect callstacks in a low-level constructor during execution  to view and debug later  so setting a breakpoint isn t of use since it will be hit thousands of times

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function Hello         alert Hello caller

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As far as I know  we have 2 way for this from given sources like this-   arguments caller  function whoCalled         if  arguments caller    null         console log  I was called from the global scope         else        console log arguments caller     called me        Function caller  function myFunc        if  myFunc caller    null          return  The function was called from the top            else            return  This function  s caller was     myFunc caller             Think u have your answer

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If you are not going to run it in IE  lt  11 then console trace   would suit   function main         Hello       function Hello         console trace      main      Hello   VM261 9    main   VM261 4

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heystewart s answer and JiarongWu s answer both mentioned that the Error object has access to the stack  Here s an example   x000D   x000D  function main       Hello       function Hello       var stack   new Error   stack       N B  stack      Error n  at Hello     n  at main      n        var m   stack match     Hello    n      n      if  m        var caller name   m 1       console log  Caller is    caller name         main    x000D   x000D   x000D   Different browsers shows the stack in different string formats  Safari    Caller is  main https   stacksnippets net js 14 8 Firefox   Caller is  main https   stacksnippets net js 14 3 Chrome    Caller is      at main  https   stacksnippets net js 14 3  IE Edge   Caller is     at main  https   stacksnippets net js 14 3  IE        Caller is     at main  https   stacksnippets net js 14 3   Most browsers will set the stack with var stack    new Error    stack  In Internet Explorer the stack will be undefined - you have to throw a real exception to retrieve the stack  Conclusion  It s possible to determine  quot main quot  is the caller to  quot Hello quot  using the  stack in the Error object  In fact it will work in cases where the callee   caller approach doesn t work  It will also show you context  i e  source file and line number  However effort is required to make the solution cross platform

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If you just want the function name and not the code  and want a browser-independent solution  use the following   var callerFunction   arguments callee caller toString   match  function            1     Note that the above will return an error if there is no caller function as there is no  1  element in the array  To work around  use the below   var callerFunction    arguments callee caller toString   match  function                null     Document Object Model   arguments callee caller toString   match  function            1   arguments callee toString   match  function            1

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Try the following code   function getStackTrace      var f   arguments callee    var ret         var item         var iter   0     while   f   f caller             Initialize     item           name  f name    null        args         Empty array   no arguments passed       callback  f                  Function arguments     if   f arguments          for   iter   0  iter lt f arguments length  iter              item args iter    f arguments iter                 else         item args   null     null   argument listing not supported            ret push  item          return ret      Worked for me in Firefox-21 and Chromium-25

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Just want to let you know that on PhoneGap Android the name doesnt seem to be working  But arguments callee caller toString   will do the trick

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Here  everything but the functionname is stripped from caller toString    with RegExp    lt  DOCTYPE html gt   lt meta charset  UTF-8  gt   lt title gt Show the callers name lt  title gt  lt  -- This validates as html5  -- gt   lt script gt  main    function main     Hello      function Hello      var name   Hello caller toString   replace   s             s   s g        name   name replace   s g        if   typeof window name       function        alert   sorry  the type of   name   is    typeof window name      else     alert   The name of the   typeof window name    that called is   name      lt  script gt

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I wanted to add my fiddle here for this   http   jsfiddle net bladnman EhUm3   I tested this is chrome  safari and IE  10 and 8   Works fine  There is only 1 function that matters  so if you get scared by the big fiddle  read below   Note  There is a fair amount of my own  boilerplate  in this fiddle  You can remove all of that and use split s if you like  It s just an ultra-safe  set of functions I ve come to rely on   There is also a  JSFiddle  template in there that I use for many fiddles to simply quick fiddling

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As none of previous answers works like what I was looking for getting just the last function caller not a function as a string or callstack  I post my solution here for those who are like me and hope this will work for them    x000D   x000D  function getCallerName func  x000D    x000D    if   func  return  anonymous   x000D    let caller   func caller  x000D    if   caller  return  anonymous   x000D    caller   caller toString    x000D    if   caller trim   startsWith  function    return  anonymous   x000D    return caller substring 0  caller indexOf       replace  function       x000D    x000D   x000D   x000D      Example of how to use  getCallerName  function x000D   x000D  function Hello    x000D  console log  ex1    gt       getCallerName Hello    x000D    x000D   x000D  function Main    x000D  Hello    x000D   x000D     another example x000D  console log  ex3    gt       getCallerName Main    x000D    x000D   x000D  Main    x000D   x000D   x000D

User · Answer

It s safer to use  arguments callee caller since arguments caller is deprecated

[javascript] How do you find out the caller function in JavaScript?

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