Javascript pointer/reference craziness. Can someone explain this?

Question

Javascript passes objects by reference. This makes perfect sense. But once you start manipulating those objects, everything acts in a way that seem unintuitive. Let me offer

Answer 1

Objects in Javascript can exist by themselves without needing a name. For example:

{}

is a new instance of a dictionary object.

a = {};

creates a new dictionary object and makes a refer to it. Now

b = a;

makes b refer to the same underlying object. You can then make a point somewhere else:

a = "hi";

and b still points to the same dictionary object it did before. The behaviour of b is unrelated to how you change what a points to.