Javascript - catch access to property of object

Like answered already, it will only be possible using the Proxy object in ECMAScript6. Meanwhile, depending on your needs and overall design, you can still achieve this by implementing something similar.

E.g.

function WrappingProxy(object, noSuchMember) {
    if (!this instanceof WrappingProxy) return new WrappingProxy(object);

    this._object = object;

    if (noSuchMember) this.noSuchMember = noSuchMember;
}

WrappingProxy.prototype = {
    constructor: WrappingProxy,

    get: function (propertyName) {
        var obj = this._object;

        if (propertyName in obj) return obj[propertyName];

        if (this.noSuchMember) this.noSuchMember(propertyName, 'property');
    },

    set: function (propertyName, value) {
        return this._object[propertyName] = value;
    },

    invoke: function (functionName) {
        var obj = this._object, 
            args = Array.prototype.slice.call(arguments, 1);

        if (functionName in obj) return obj[functionName].apply(obj, args);

        if (this.noSuchMember) {
            this.noSuchMember.apply(obj, [functionName, 'function'].concat(args));
        }
    },

    object: function() { return this._object },

    noSuchMember: null
};

var obj = new WrappingProxy({
        testProp: 'test',
        testFunc: function (v) {
            return v;
        }
    },
    //noSuchMember handler
    function (name, type) {
        console.log(name, type, arguments[2]);
    }
);

obj.get('testProp'); //test
obj.get('nonExistingProperty'); //undefined, call noSuchMember
obj.invoke('testFunc', 'test'); //test
obj.invoke('nonExistingFunction', 'test'); //undefined, call noSuchMember

//accesing properties directly on the wrapped object is not monitored
obj.object().nonExistingProperty;

I'll write this under the assumption you're trying to debug something. As Crowder said, this is only available on newer browsers; so it's very useful for testing code that does something you don't want it to. But, I remove it for production code.

Object.defineProperty(Foo, 'bar', {
  set: function() {
    debugger; // Here is where I'll take a look in the developer console, figure out what's
    // gone wrong, and then remove this whole block.
  }
});

Looks like megawac beat me to it. You can also find some Mozilla documentation on the features here.

Yes, this is possible in ES2015+, using the Proxy. It's not possible in ES5 and earlier, not even with polyfills.

It took me a while, but I finally found my previous answer to this question. See that answer for all the details on proxies and such.

Here's the proxy example from that answer:

const obj = new Proxy({}, {
    get: function(target, name, receiver) {
        if (!(name in target)) {
            console.log("Getting non-existant property '" + name + "'");
            return undefined;
        }
        return Reflect.get(target, name, receiver);
    },
    set: function(target, name, value, receiver) {
        if (!(name in target)) {
            console.log("Setting non-existant property '" + name + "', initial value: " + value);
        }
        return Reflect.set(target, name, value, receiver);
    }
});

console.log("[before] obj.foo = " + obj.foo);
obj.foo = "bar";
console.log("[after] obj.foo = " + obj.foo);
obj.foo = "baz";
console.log("[after] obj.foo = " + obj.foo);

Live Copy:

"use strict";

const obj = new Proxy({}, {
    get: function(target, name, receiver) {
        if (!(name in target)) {
            console.log("Getting non-existant property '" + name + "'");
            return undefined;
        }
        return Reflect.get(target, name, receiver);
    },
    set: function(target, name, value, receiver) {
        if (!(name in target)) {
            console.log("Setting non-existant property '" + name + "', initial value: " + value);
        }
        return Reflect.set(target, name, value, receiver);
    }
});

console.log("[before] obj.foo = " + obj.foo);
obj.foo = "bar";
console.log("[after] obj.foo = " + obj.foo);
obj.foo = "baz";
console.log("[after] obj.foo = " + obj.foo);

When run, that outputs:

Getting non-existant property 'foo'
[before] obj.foo = undefined
Setting non-existant property 'foo', initial value: bar
[after] obj.foo = bar
[after] obj.foo = baz