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copied!<p>You should use two functions: the first to parse the mask, and then second to randomly choose names.</p> <p>Parsing the mask is straightforward enough. A regular expression can be used to retrieve an array of all the keys. Then you can loop through these performing the replacements.</p> <pre><code>function names(mask, callback) { var replaced = mask; //get an array of all the keys (with braces) var keys = mask.match(/{[mflr]}/g); for (var i=0; i<keys.length; i++) { //extract the "f" from "{f}" var type = keys[i].charAt(1); //make the replacement replaced = replaced.replace(keys[i], getNameFromObject(type)); } callback(replaced); } </code></pre> <p>The role of the second function is to choose a name from the object of names, given a certain type. In the question, this object has the identifier "names". This is also the identifier of the function that parses the mask. I recommend renaming the object to something similar to "allNames" because it will avoid possible namespace conflicts and is more expressive of the nature of the object.</p> <p>As suggested, Math.random() and Math.floor() are used to choose a random index of a name. You should not use Math.ceil(), as this might cause an off-by-one error, or require subtraction by one.</p> <pre><code>function getNameFromObject(type) { if (type == 'r') type = (Math.random() > 0.5)? 'm' : 'f'; //assuming that the object has the type of name being requested //NOTE: "allNames" is used as the identifier of the data object var possibleNames = allNames[type]; //assuming the arrays can't be empty var randomIndex = Math.floor(Math.random() * possibleNames.length); return possibleNames[randomIndex]; } </code></pre>

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