String Equality in Google Apps Script

Question

I'm trying to compare a name retrieved from a JSON object, with a name as it exists on a google Sheet. Try as I might, I can't get a comparison that yields a positive. I've tried:

IndexOf

localeCompare

==

===

I've tried key===value String(key)===String(value) and String(key).valueof()=String(value).valueof. I've also tried calling trim() on everything to make sure there are no leading/trailing white spaces (there aren't, as confirmed with a length() comparison.

As you can see from the screen shot, the values of key and value are exactly the same. Any pointers would be gratefully received. This has held up my project for days!

Screenshot here

Answer 1

Description

This is not a solution but it might help find the problem. Perhaps the characters in one or the other is not what you think. Visually they compare, but what if one has a tab instead of a space. Try this, list the character codes for each and see if any character has a different value.

I've added another option that eliminates the for loop thanks to @TheMaster

Script (Option 1)

function test() {
  try {
    let text = SpreadsheetApp.getActiveSpreadsheet().getSheetByName("Test").getRange("A1").getValue();
    console.log(text);
    let code = [];
    for( let i=0; i<text.length; i++ ) {
      code.push(text.charCodeAt(i))
    }
    console.log(code.join());
  }
  catch(err) {
    console.log(err);
  }
}

Script (Option 2)

function test() {
  try {
    let text = SpreadsheetApp.getActiveSpreadsheet().getSheetByName("Test").getRange("A1").getValue();
    console.log(text);
    let code = [];
    [...text].forEach( char => code.push(char.charCodeAt(0)) );
    console.log(code.join());
  }
  catch(err) {
    console.log(err);
  }
}

Execution log

7:57:53 AM  Notice  Execution started
7:57:56 AM  Info    Archie White
7:57:56 AM  Info    65,114,99,104,105,101,32,87,104,105,116,101
7:57:54 AM  Notice  Execution completed

Answer 2

Compare

function compare() {
  const json = '{"values":[["good","bad","ugly"]]}';
  const obj = JSON.parse(json);
  const ss = SpreadsheetApp.getActive();
  const sh = ss.getSheetByName("Sheet0");
  const [hA,...vs] = sh.getDataRange().getDisplayValues();
  let matches = [];
  vs.forEach((r,i) => {
    r.forEach((c,j) => {
      let idx = obj.values[0].indexOf(c);
      if(~idx) {
        matches.push({row:i+1,col:j+1,index: idx});
      }
    })
  })
  Logger.log(JSON.stringify(matches))
 }

Execution log
9:31:50 AM  Notice  Execution started
9:31:52 AM  Info    [{"row":1,"col":1,"index":0},{"row":2,"col":1,"index":1},{"row":3,"col":1,"index":2}]
9:31:51 AM  Notice  Execution completed

Sheet1:

COL1
good
bad
ugly