Return the ordinal suffix for a number.

annotated.js

function(
  a                         // number
){
  return[
    "th","st","nd","rd"     // array of ordinal suffixes
  ][  
    (a=~~                   // floor the value for usable index (integer)
    (a<0?-a:a)              // absolute value for usable index (positive)
    %100)                   // mod 100 to ensure teens edge case is handled every century
    >10&&a<14               // handle teens edge case where 11-13 return "th"
    ||(a%=10)               // mod 10 to check ones column digit
    >3                      // all digits above 3 return "th"
    ?0                      // return "th" for above cases
    :a                      // return "th", "st", "rd" for others
  ]
}

index.js

function b(a){return["th","st","nd","rd"][(a=~~(a<0?-a:a)%100)>10&&a<14||(a%=10)>3?0:a]}

LICENSE.txt

Copyright (c) 2011 Dave Furfero, http://furf.com
 
Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining
a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the
"Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including
without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish,
distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to
permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to
the following conditions:
 
The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be
included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.
 
THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND,
EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF
MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND
NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE
LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION
OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION
WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.

package.json

{
  "name": "ordinal",
  "description": "Return the ordinal suffix for a number.",
  "keywords": ["ordinal","number","suffix","string"]
}

great work! just out of curiosity, why no return the ordinalized value instead of just the suffix?

thanks! when i originally wrote this snippet, i included the value as well, but the second time i used it, i needed only the returned suffix to place inside a separate span, hidden for accessibility, while visually displaying the inning number (a constraint of the layout). also, a user might want to superscript the suffix. (you can see it in action by inspecting the inning number on the mlb.com homepage scoreboard.) i felt it provided the greater flexibility to exclude it and that it was easy enough to code "n + ordinal(n)" when needed. but for this application, i suppose i have quite a few characters left to make it optional. :)

instead of adding an option, maybe you could also return [num,ord]? that way it's easy enough to extract what you want.

ordinal(32)[1]
ordinal(32).join('')

Interesting. I would prefer your syntax in the case where the value being passed is not stored.

32+ordinal(32) // looks a little silly

But in other cases, that syntax would be longer. If I were to support the return of the value, the optional concatenation is more terse and provides a more traditional API.

// suffix-only usage
ordinal(n)            // current suffix-only
ordinal(n)[1]         // return [value, suffix] array
ordinal(n)            // optional concatenation

// value-added usage
n+ordinal(n)          // current suffix-only
ordinal(n).join('')   // return [value, suffix] array
ordinal(n,1)          // optional concatenation

PS--I'm really digging the 140bytes project. Lots of good reads. Cheers!

My version.

function(a){return[,"st","nd","rd"][/1?.$/.exec(a)]||"th"}

i like the use of the empty array member. i avoided regexp for performance. http://jsperf.com/ordinals-in-140-bytes (this code actually runs on mlb.com :)) but in the world of code golf you win!

tsaniel's version add's a lot of overhead, buried in the 'regexp black-box'.

If it's code golf we play, then we can't allow ourselves defining a function to get us the decimal exponent:
d = function (i){var l=Math.log; return Math.ceil(l(i)/l(10))}

Here's a version using a map-reduce-like logic
current version here: https://gist.github.com/1308753

// JS converts string-numbers on the fly e.g. "7"&3 >3
// solution with a 'map-reduce' mindset
// similar and more concise solutions could be implemented
// a=(a+'').substr(-2); 
ord = function (a){
    //summary: cast to string, map (e.g. atomize) and reduce
    a=(a+'')                            //cast to string
    .split('')                          //atomize
    .slice(-2)                          //get the last two elements
    .reduce(                            //reduce arithmetically to a single value
        function(a,b){
            if(1==a) return 0;          //teens case -> return 0 (#el containing 'th') 
            else return b>3 ? 0 : b;    //if b>3 return 0 -> 'th'
        }
    );
    return ['th','st','nd','rd'][a];    //map number to a string
};

another difference between our implementations: mine is the only one to base ordinal suffix on the whole number, not the decimal. since ordinals are natural numbers [0, 1, 2, ...], i felt that the floor of the number was the meaningful part to transform. i could be wrong. i suppose it's a matter of semantics and usage which implementation works best.

so, in seeing these other implementations and thinking it through... in the case of a decimal being passed and the suffix returned being based on a transformation of the passed argument, then jed, your suggestion of returning [n, suffix] would be desirable where n is the floored number. (or n + suffix)

thanks for the posts, guys.

New version with a bitwise trick but only supports non-negative integers:

function(a){return[,'st','nd','rd'][a%100/10^1&&a%10]||'th'}

21th? 22th? 23th?

11st? 12nd? 13rd? Keep trying! :)

i like tsaniels bitwise the best for all practical purposes. non-negative integers are typically all you'll need.

fixd?

function(a){a+="";return(a.charAt(a.length-2)==1)?"th":[,"st","nd","rd"][a.charAt(a.length-1)]||"th"}
Edit:
made it shorter with "%"
function(a){return(a%100>10&&a%100<19)?"th":[,"st","nd","rd"][a%10]||"th"}
Edit:
I just noticed Tsaniel's function... it's shorter than mine, therefore, my function is useless... meh.

@furf: Did you mean you find a bug? But it just works fine with me.

@tsaniel no, he found a bug in my code, I deleted the original post. Your function is perfect.

Oh I see.
Shave another byte off by the way:

function(a){return[,'st','nd','rd'][a/10%10^1&&a%10]||'th'}