“Callback hell” is a real place, and it is a place that you create for yourself.

It’s pretty easy to fall into the trap of nesting virtually infinitely. And just like most things in life, it’s easy to attribute the trouble that you have encountered to other people as opposed to mistakes that you have made.

Step 1: Name your functions.

Are you naming all of your functions? NO?! Are you kidding me? Consider the following:

thing.on('event', function() {
  return 0
}

vs

thing.on('event', eventThinger)

function eventThinger() {
  return 0
}

Which makes more sense immediately? Which seems scalable?

Step 2: Use modules.

Are you putting all of your JS in one file? Oh god. No wonder you are having trouble. You need to choose a module system. Be it browserify or.. actually, let’s just use browserify.

This will allow you to require modules and write your code in a sane way.

Step 3: Consider state.

If you can save some indentation without causing confusion by simply dictating shared state, it just might be worth it.

Example:

function lol() {
  var state = 'a'

  parse()

  function parse() {
    console.log(state)
  }
}

vs

var state = 'a'

function lol() {
  parse()
}

function parse() {
  console.log(state)
}

Step 4: Return early

function test(str) {
  if(str.length) {
    return str.split('').reverse().join('')
  } else {
    return 'No string found!'
  }
}

vs.

function test(str) {
  if(!str.length) return 'No string found!'

  return str.split('').reverse().join('')
}