This question is quite old, so as a contemporary update. With the onset of ES2015 there are alternatives to get a hold of the data you require. There is now a feature called object destructing for accessing nested objects.

const data = {
  code: 42,
  items: [{
    id: 1,
    name: 'foo'
  }, {
    id: 2,
    name: 'bar'
  }]
};

const {
  items: [, {
    name: secondName
  }]
} = data;

console.log(secondName);

The above example creates a variable called secondName from the name key from an array called items, the lonely , says skip the first object in the array.

Notably it's probably overkill for this example, as simple array acccess is easier to read, but it comes in useful when breaking apart objects in general.

This is very brief intro to your specific use case, destructing can be an unusual syntax to get used to at first. I'd recommend reading Mozilla's Destructing Assignment documentation to learn more.

This question is quite old, so as a contemporary update. With the onset of ES2015 there are alternatives to get a hold of the data you require. There is now a feature called object destructuring for accessing nested objects.

const data = {
  code: 42,
  items: [{
    id: 1,
    name: 'foo'
  }, {
    id: 2,
    name: 'bar'
  }]
};

const {
  items: [, {
    name: secondName
  }]
} = data;

console.log(secondName);

The above example creates a variable called secondName from the name key from an array called items, the lonely , says skip the first object in the array.

Notably it's probably overkill for this example, as simple array acccess is easier to read, but it comes in useful when breaking apart objects in general.

This is very brief intro to your specific use case, destructuring can be an unusual syntax to get used to at first. I'd recommend reading Mozilla's Destructuring Assignment documentation to learn more.

This question is quite old, so as a contemporary update. With the onset of ES2015 there are alternatives to get a hold of the data you require. There is now a feature called object destructing for accessing nested objects.

var data = {
  code: 42,
  items: [{
    id: 1,
    name: 'foo'
  }, {
    id: 2,
    name: 'bar'
  }]
};


let {
  items: [, {
    name: secondName
  }]
} = data;

console.log(secondName);

https://jsfiddle.net/alexkey/8eoeaj4v/

The above example creates a variable called secondName from the name key from an array called items, the lonely , says skip the first object in the array.

Notably it's probably overkill for this example, as simple array acccess is easier to read, but it comes in useful when breaking apart objects in general.

This is very brief intro to your specific use case, destructing can be an unusual syntax to get used to at first. I'd recommend reading Mozilla's Destructing Assignment documentation to learn more.

This question is quite old, so as a contemporary update. With the onset of ES2015 there are alternatives to get a hold of the data you require. There is now a feature called object destructing for accessing nested objects.

const data = {
  code: 42,
  items: [{
    id: 1,
    name: 'foo'
  }, {
    id: 2,
    name: 'bar'
  }]
};

const {
  items: [, {
    name: secondName
  }]
} = data;

console.log(secondName);

The above example creates a variable called secondName from the name key from an array called items, the lonely , says skip the first object in the array.

Notably it's probably overkill for this example, as simple array acccess is easier to read, but it comes in useful when breaking apart objects in general.

This is very brief intro to your specific use case, destructing can be an unusual syntax to get used to at first. I'd recommend reading Mozilla's Destructing Assignment documentation to learn more.