ASP Dictionary Object

The Dictionary Object

The Dictionary object is used to store information in name/value pairs (referred to as key and item). The Dictionary object might seem similar to Arrays, however, the Dictionary object is a more desirable solution to manipulate related data.
Comparing Dictionaries and Arrays:

• Keys are used to identify the items in a Dictionary object
• You do not have to call ReDim to change the size of the Dictionary object
• When deleting an item from a Dictionary, the remaining items will automatically shift up
• Dictionaries cannot be multidimensional, Arrays can
• Dictionaries have more built-in functions than Arrays
• Dictionaries work better than arrays on accessing random elements frequently
• Dictionaries work better than arrays on locating items by their content

The following example creates a Dictionary object, adds some key/item pairs to it, and retrieves the item value for the key gr:

<% Dim d Set d=Server.CreateObject("Scripting.Dictionary") d.Add "re","Red" d.Add "gr","Green" d.Add "bl","Blue" d.Add "pi","Pink" Response.Write("The value of key gr is: " & d.Item("gr")) %> Output: The value of key gr is: Green

The Dictionary object's properties and methods are described below:

Properties

Property	Description
CompareMode	Sets or returns the comparison mode for comparing keys in a Dictionary object
Count	Returns the number of key/item pairs in a Dictionary object
Item	Sets or returns the value of an item in a Dictionary object
Key	Sets a new key value for an existing key value in a Dictionary object

Methods

Method	Description
Add	Adds a new key/item pair to a Dictionary object
Exists	Returns a Boolean value that indicates whether a specified key exists in the Dictionary object
Items	Returns an array of all the items in a Dictionary object
Keys	Returns an array of all the keys in a Dictionary object
Remove	Removes one specified key/item pair from the Dictionary object
RemoveAll	Removes all the key/item pairs in the Dictionary object