Having opened my eyes to the need to be very intentional on if I am using a copy of a msg or a reference to the message, I have started using RED.util.cloneMessage() when I need a copy to manipulate that won't maninpulate the original msg. Since messages are objects, getting a clone of the msg seem…

As Dave points out, cloneMessage uses the lodash.clonedeep module under the covers. The JSON.parse(JSON.stringify()) method will only work for JSON encodable values - as the article you link to highlights. The fact we use lodash under the covers means we can handle lots of the common JavaScript obj…

If you dig into the util.js code inside the Node-RED source you will find that it requires... const clonedeep = require("lodash.clonedeep");

Based on this, then it seems the best pattern would be to use RED.util.cloneMessage() in Node-RED to take advantage of both lodash.clonedeep and the Node-RED specific additional coding under the covers and probably to use lodash.clonedeep elsewhere. Thanks for the feedback both of you.

Deep Copy of Arrays and Objects using RED.util.cloneMessage()

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Deep Copy of Arrays and Objects using RED.util.cloneMessage()

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