Passing an array to a JSON object for Jade rendering - node.js

Question

I have a node.js server written in express and at a certain moment I send to some .jade page an array. The problem is that when rendering the Jade page, the Jade compiler renders the array as [object Object] and the JavaScript compiler on Chrome complains about it saying "Unexpected identifier".
This is the Jade code:
!!! 5
html(lang="en")
head
title= "Rankings"
body
h1 Ranking
div(id="rankings")
script(type='text/javascript')
function fillRanking(){
var rankArray = #{ranking};
alert("inside fillranking");
var divElement = document.getElementById("rankings");
for(var i = 0; i< rankArray.length; i++){
divElements.innerHTML += "" + i+1 + ". " + rankArray[i].Username + " " + rankArray[i].Points;
}
}
fillRanking();
As you can see it's really simple, I just fill a div with the info given by what's inside the #{ranking} variable passed by node.js to Jade. The alert on the second line doesn't fire because the Unexpected Identifier error happens as soon as I try to assign the #{ranking} variable.
The following is the code in my node.js with express
app.get('/ranking', function (req, res) {
//get the first ten people in the ranking
var firstTen = getRanking(10, function(results){
//compute the array of results
var result = {
ranking: [],
}
for(var i = 0; i < results.length; i++){
result.ranking[i] = results[i];
}
//render the ranking with all the info
console.log(result);
res.render(__dirname + '/pages/ranking/ranking.jade', {
ranking: result,
});
});
});
I create an object with inside an array of results, I put the results I found out of the query inside it and I pass it to the rendering engine. The console.log(results) call prints the result object correctly, for example like this:
{ ranking:
[ { Username: 'usr1',
_id: 4ed27319c1d767f70e000002,
Points: 100 },
{ Username: 'usr2',
_id: 4ed27326c1d767f70e000003,
Points: 100 } ]
}
I don't really know how to handle the variable passed to the Jade page. Whichever thing I do I keep getting the "Unexpected identifier" error.
Does anyone of you know how do I solve this?
Thanks

Answer 1

Looking at the comments above and investigating a little bit more, here's what I've found to work:
Use this on your javascript (/controller):
...
res.render(__dirname + '/pages/ranking/ranking.jade', {
ranking: JSON.stringify(ranking),
})
...
And on jade template:
...
function fillRanking(){
var rankArray = !{ranking};
alert("inside fillranking");
...
This works because !{} doesn't perform escaping.

Answer 2

This works for me.
JSON.stringify the array (or any arbitrary JSON object really) on the server and then JSON.parse it on the client.
server-side:
res.render(__dirname + '/pages/ranking/ranking.jade', {
ranking: JSON.stringify(result),
});
client-side:
var rankArray = JSON.parse( !{JSON.stringify(ranking)} );

Answer 3

Because I also use the array from the controller for iteration, I did this:
res.render('template', pArrayOfData);
And in the jade code:
script(type='text/javascript').
var _histData = !{JSON.stringify(pArrayOfData)};

Answer 4

I encountered the same problem and was able make it work with a slight variation (thanks to the solutions above).
From my code:
Backend:
Stringify the JSON array
router.get('/', function(req, res) {
var data = JSON.stringify(apiData); // <====
res.render('gallery', { data: apiData });
});
Frontend:
Stringify again with the !{}
function injectDataOnView() {
var data = !{JSON.stringify(data)}; // <====
var divElement = document.getElementById('data');
divElement.innerHTML = data[1]['id']; // <=== just a test, so no for loop
}
injectDataOnView();