Simple pluralise in JavaScript

While working with Vue.js on top of a Ruby on Rails stack, I found myselfreplicating on the front end a few of the helpful utilities we had access to inthe back end. One of them was pluralise , either with or withoutnumber.

After finding several components with similar ternaries trying to figureout if the singular or plural version of a word should be used, I saw a goodopportunity to extract that logic to its own piece and I ended up with this:

const pluralize = (count, singular, { plural, number } = {}) => {
  const message = count === 1 ? singular : (plural || `${singular}s`);

  return number === false ? message : `${count} ${message}`;
};

// Uses:
pluralize(1, 'mouse') // 1 mouse
pluralize(2, 'house') // 2 houses
pluralize(2, 'house', { number: false }) // houses
pluralize(2, 'mouse', { plural: 'mice' }) // 10 mice
pluralize(2, 'mouse', { plural: 'mice', number: false }) // mice

In a nutshell, this is how it works:

• You always need to pass the number to be considered and the singular form,which will give you <number> <bigger than 1 ? (singular + 's') : singular>;
• If the plural is irregular (i.e. it’s not just the singular plus an s),you can provide it;
• If you just need the singular/plural without the number, you can say so.

Bonus points: if you’re a bit of a minimalist and enjoy saying some keystrokes,you could set up something like this:

// plural with number
const pn = (n, s, plural) => pluralize(n, s, { plural });
// plural without number
const p = (n, s, plural) => pluralize(n, s, { plural, number: false });