[javascript] Why is my variable unaltered after I modify it inside of a function? - Asynchronous code reference

Here's a more concise answer for people that are looking for a quick reference as well as some examples using promises and async/await.

Start with the naive approach (that doesn't work) for a function that calls an asynchronous method (in this case setTimeout) and returns a message:

function getMessage() {
  var outerScopeVar;
  setTimeout(function() {
    outerScopeVar = 'Hello asynchronous world!';
  }, 0);
  return outerScopeVar;
}
console.log(getMessage());

undefined gets logged in this case because getMessage returns before the setTimeout callback is called and updates outerScopeVar.

The two main ways to solve it are using callbacks and promises:

Callbacks

The change here is that getMessage accepts a callback parameter that will be called to deliver the results back to the calling code once available.

function getMessage(callback) {
  setTimeout(function() {
    callback('Hello asynchronous world!');
  }, 0);
}
getMessage(function(message) {
  console.log(message);
});

Promises

Promises provide an alternative which is more flexible than callbacks because they can be naturally combined to coordinate multiple async operations. A Promises/A+ standard implementation is natively provided in node.js (0.12+) and many current browsers, but is also implemented in libraries like Bluebird and Q.

function getMessage() {
  return new Promise(function(resolve, reject) {
    setTimeout(function() {
      resolve('Hello asynchronous world!');
    }, 0);
  });
}

getMessage().then(function(message) {
  console.log(message);  
});

jQuery Deferreds

jQuery provides functionality that's similar to promises with its Deferreds.

function getMessage() {
  var deferred = $.Deferred();
  setTimeout(function() {
    deferred.resolve('Hello asynchronous world!');
  }, 0);
  return deferred.promise();
}

getMessage().done(function(message) {
  console.log(message);  
});

async/await

If your JavaScript environment includes support for async and await (like Node.js 7.6+), then you can use promises synchronously within async functions:

function getMessage () {
    return new Promise(function(resolve, reject) {
        setTimeout(function() {
            resolve('Hello asynchronous world!');
        }, 0);
    });
}

async function main() {
    let message = await getMessage();
    console.log(message);
}

main();