Video Poker in JavaScript

An early JavaScript coding exercise turned into a not-too-awful video poker game.


When I started learning JavaScript my first project (aside from tutorials) was to build a video poker game. I decided to dust it off, fix a couple of things, and post it here for kicks.

The JavaScript is not exactly well-written or efficient, but as far as I can tell it works accurately. For the curious, it utilizes a Fisher-Yates shuffle and array comparisons to evaluate winning hands.

The Fisher-Yates shuffle (graciously borrowed from Mike Bostock):

function shuffle(deck) {
    var m = deck.length, t, i;
    // While there remain elements to shuffle…
    while (m) {
        // Pick a remaining element…
        i = Math.floor(Math.random() * m--);
        // And swap it with the current element.
        t = deck[m];
        deck[m] = deck[i];
        deck[i] = t;
    }
  return deck;
};

And an example of a (poorly designed) evaluation test for straights:

function straightTest() {
    cards.sort();
    var str = '2345A 23456789 06789 0789J 089JQ 09JKQ 0AJKQ'
    var find = cards.toString().replace(/,/g,'');
    return str.indexOf(find) < 0 ? false : true;
};

Enjoy! (Click cards to hold, then use the button to draw/deal.)


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