Framework objects in an Ember application (components, services, routes, etc.) are created via a factory and dependency injection system. Each of these objects is the responsibility of an "owner", which handled its instantiation and manages its lifetime.

getOwner fetches the owner object responsible for an instance. This can be used to lookup or resolve other class instances, or register new factories into the owner.

For example, this component dynamically looks up a service based on the audioType passed as an attribute:

        
          
              audio.js
            

          
              
              import Component from '@ember/component';
import { computed } from '@ember/object';
import { getOwner } from '@ember/application';

// Usage:
//
//   {{play-audio audioType=model.audioType audioFile=model.file}}
//
export default Component.extend({
  audioService: computed('audioType', function() {
    let owner = getOwner(this);
    return owner.lookup(`service:${this.get('audioType')}`);
  }),

  click() {
    let player = this.get('audioService');
    player.play(this.get('audioFile'));
  }
});
            

        
      

Function

setOwner (object, object) public