React userReducer init function not triggering on props update - reactjs

I have a component which is a form which I use to create records in my database. I also want to be able to pass into this component values with which to populate the form, allowing me to then update my existing database records. Straightforward add/edit functionality from the same component.
The following code should explain how I am doing this. The media prop is an object containing the data. I have this data already in the parent element so setting the values here is fine and they pass thru without problem. However once the page is loaded the 3rd init argument of useReducer never re-triggers, and therefore my state cannot be overridden with the values passed down in the media prop. Is there a correct way to make the init function trigger when the props are updated, or is my issue architectural?
const MediaUploadForm = ({ media }) => {
const init = (initialState) => {
if (media) {
// ... here I extract the values I need and override the initialState where required
} else {
return initialState
}
}
const [formState, dispatch] = useReducer(
MediaFormReducer,
initialState,
init
)

So using the new React hooks features and keeping the component functional allows me to use useEffects() This is similar to using a componentDidUpdate type event. So the following code allows me to check for the status of a prop (media) and then dispatch an action that sets my redux state.
useEffect(() => {
if (media && id !== media.id) {
dispatch(loadMedia(media))
}
})
Thanks to #sliptype for pointing me in the right direction

Copying props into state is considered an anti pattern in React. Props changes do not trigger reinitialising state, as you have seen.
This is described in https://reactjs.org/blog/2018/06/07/you-probably-dont-need-derived-state.html.
From the recap it looks like the current suggested solution matches
Alternative 1: To reset only certain state fields, watch for changes in a special property (e.g. props.userID).
This is an alternative, rather than the recommendation.
https://reactjs.org/blog/2018/06/07/you-probably-dont-need-derived-state.html#recap
Hope this link gives you more information around the topic, and the recommendations there help in future work.

Related

Component calls Reselect only at the first time it renders

I'm building Multiple Select component for user to select the seasons on the post. So use can choose Spring and Fall. Here I'm using reselect to track selected objects.
My problem is that my reselect doesn't trigger one it renders at the first time. This question looks pretty long but it has many console.log() lines for clarification. So please bear with me! :)
('main.js') Here is my modal Component. Data for this.state.items is seasons = [{id: '100', value: 'All',}, { id: '101', value: 'Spring',}, { ... }]
return (
<SelectorModal
isSelectorVisible={this.state.isSelectorVisible}
multiple={this.state.multiple}
items={this.state.items}
hideSelector={this._hideSelector}
selectAction={this._selectAction}
seasonSelectAction={this._seasonSelectAction}
/>
('main.js') As you can see I pass _seasonSelectAction to handle selecting items. (It adds/removes an object to/from the array of this.state.selectedSeasonIds). selectedSeasonIds: [] is defined in the state. Let's look at the function.
_seasonSelectAction = (id) => {
let newSelectedSeasonIds = [...this.state.selectedSeasonIds, id];
this.setState({selectedSeasonIds : newSelectedSeasonIds});
console.log(this.state.selectedSeasonIds); <- FOR DEBUGGING
console.log(newSelectedSeasonIds); <- For DEBUGGING
}
I confirmed that it prints ids of selected Item. Probably providing code of SelectorModal.js is irrelevant to this question. So let's move on... :)
('main.js') Here is where I called createSelector
function mapStateToProps(state) {
return {
seasons: SelectedSeasonsSelector(state)
}
}
export default connect(mapStateToProps, null)(...);
(selected_seasons.js) Finally, here is the reselect file
import { createSelector } from 'reselect';
// creates select function to pick off the pieces of states
const seasonsSelector = state => state.seasons
const selectedSeasonsSelector = state => state.selectedSeasonIds
const getSeasons = (seasons, selectedSeasonIds) => {
const selectedSeasons = _.filter(
seasons,
season => _.contains(selectedSeasonIds, season.id)
);
console.log('----------------------');
console.log('getSeasons');
console.log(selectedSeasons); <<- You can see this output below
console.log('seaons');
console.log(seasons);
console.log('----------------------');
return selectedSeasons;
}
export default createSelector(
seasonsSelector,
selectedSeasonsSelector,
getSeasons
);
The output for system console is below
----------------------
getSeasons
Array []
seaons
undefined
----------------------
Thank you for reading this whole question and please let me know if you have any question on this problem.
UPDATE As Vlad recommended, I put SelectedSeasonsSelector inside of _renderSeasons but it prints empty result like above every time I select something. I think it can't get state.seasons, state.
_renderSeasons = () => {
console.log(this.state.seasons) // This prints as expected. But this becomes undefined
//when I pass this.state in to the SelectedSeasonsSelector
selectedSeasons = SelectedSeasonsSelector(this.state)
console.log('how work');
console.log(selectedSeasons);
let seasonList = selectedSeasons.map((season) => {
return ' '+season;
})
return seasonList
}
state.seasons and state.selectedSeasonsIds are getting undefined
Looks like you are assuming that this.setState will change redux store, but it won't.
In a _seasonSelectAction method you are calling this.setState that stores selected ids in container's local state.
However selectors are expect ids will be be stored in global redux store.
So you have to pass selected id's to redux store, instead of storing them in a local state. And this parts are looks missing:
dispatch action
use reducer to store this info into redux store.
add mapDispatchToProps handler to your connect
I'm guessing here, but it looks like confusing terms:component local state is not the same as redux store state. First one is local to your component and can be accessed through this.state attributive. Second is global data related to all of your application, stored in redux store and could be accessed by getState redux method.
I so you probably have to decide, whether to stay with redux stack or create pure react component. If pure react is your choice, than you dint have to use selectors, otherwise you have to dispatch action and more likely remove this.state.

Multiple dispatch calls from component react/redux

I don't really know why I can't get this to work. All the evidence talks against it...This is the situation:
I have a grid of data and a search panel. When the search panel is changed the searchparams are updated and used for updating the data grid.
The thing which triggers the chain is when the user changes the search panel. In my component i handle search panel changes with this:
getPhotos(key, value) {
const change = [{ key: key, value: value},{ key: 'page', value: 1}]
this.props.dispatch(updateSearchParams(change))
console.log('payload.searchParams', this.props.searchParams);
this.props.dispatch(
getPhotos(
{ context:this.props.params.context,
searchParams: this.props.searchParams }
)
);
}
Thus two dispatch calls to action creators form the component. The problem is that the searchparams are not updated in time for the getPhotos call, so the grid is not updated accordingly.
I thought that dispatch calls were synchronous - thus one after the other. I guess that it is the round trip from the component, to the action creator, to the store and reducer which is "screwing" it up.
The first call does not involve any asynchronous calls.
What is the "right" way of doing this? Please be specific about what goes in the component, the action creator and the reducer.
Thanks
dispatch is synchronous (unless you are using some middleware like redux-thunk). But after this.props.dispatch(updateSearchParams(change))
, your component needs to be updated (a re-render) or the this.props.searchParams is still the old one.
You can write this.props.dispatch(getPhotos(...)) in componentWillReceiveProps(nextProps), so you can access the new props (nextProps)
If you are using redux-thunk and two actions updateSearchParams and getPhotos are always bind together, you can create another aggregated action creator for them.
const updateSearchParams = change => dispatch => {
// return a promise here
// or use callback style etc. whatever you prefered
}
const updateSearchParamsAndGetPhotos = (change, context) => dispatch => {
dispatch(updateSearchParams(change))
.then(res => {
dispatch(getPhotos({
context,
searchParams: res.data.searchParams
}))
})
}
So now after dispatching a single action, your component should receive the new photos.
I had it wrong from the beginning.
The searchparams should not go into the store. I can handle the in the component alone - in the state of the component.
This the simplifies and eliminates the problem I described above.
Of cause there could be a situation where the searchparams needed to be available for other components. In that case I would go for #CodinCat answer above with the thunk. It works, i managed to implement it before my realisation.
Thanks

Preventing component updates from multiple props in react

I have a react/redux app which has a recharts chart which animates when data is changed.
I'm using Redux and most of my actions only change a single state property which results in a single props pass. However, some of my actions are now using thunks for some async actions and calling other actions.
For example, I might have an action getChartData which would be called when the user selects an axis.
export let getChartData = axis => dispatch => {
// trimmed for brevity
fetchJSON(url).then(data => {
dispatch(dataRetrievalSuccess(data));
dispatch(updateSelectedAxis(axis));
}).catch(error => {
dispatch(dataRetrievalError(error));
});
};
In this example the updateSelectedAxis value will change a local state property responsible for displaying the currently selected axis and the dataRetrievalSuccess function would be responsible for passing props.data to the chart.
The problem I'm trying to solve is to prevent the chart from updating when the selectedAxis props of the component change but the data hasn't.
I thought I would be able to use something like componentWillRecieveProps but the issue I have here with my above thunk example is that I get one call to componentWillRecieveProps when I call dataRetrievalSuccess which has the same data in both this.props.data and nextProps.data so I can prevent the update. However when I subsequently call updateSelectedAxis I don't have the data as part of the props as it's already changed, so I can't perform logic operations based on the two values.
I thought this was possibly an ordering issue, but even if I pack this into a single action I still get multiple setting of props.
Would I solve this issue by packaging up the data and the change of axis into a single object?
I'm not quite sure the best way to go about this architecturally and would welcome any suggestions.
EDIT:
Just to expand a little, I am dispatching two actions, both which change their own bit of state which causes two renders.
I've tried writing something like this:
shouldComponentUpdate(nextProps, nextState) {
if(this.dataHasChanged(nextProps)) {
return true;
}
return false;
}
Which almost works, but each time the data the chart shows is one render behind where it needs to be.
You can access the current State of store under action creator using thunk (as thunk inject the state for you.) , then compare ajax response data with previous state data to dispatch new action.
export let getChartData = axis => (getState, dispatch) => {
// trimmed for brevity
fetchJSON(url).then(data => {
if(getState().data !== data){
dispatch(dataRetrievalSuccess(data));
dispatch(updateSelectedAxis(axis));
}
}).catch(error => {
dispatch(dataRetrievalError(error));
});
};

Removing item from redux-stored list and redirect back to list - delay props evaluating?

I'm having view with list of Steps. Each step can be "viewed" and "removed" from within the "view" screen.
My StepDetails component binds to redux store by fetching corresponding step from steps part of store with simple steps.find(...):
const mapStateToProps = (state, ownProps) => {
let stepId = ownProps.params.stepId;
let step = state.steps.find(s => s.id === stepId);
return {step};
};
Now when (from within "details") I hit "Delete step" I want this step to be removed from store and I want to navigate to list view.
There is redux action invoked on delete that returns new steps list without this one removed and redirect is called afterwards:
const deleteStep = (stepId) => {
return dispatch => {
return stepsApi.deleteStep(stepId).then(steps => {
dispatch(action(STEPS_LIST_CHANGED, {steps}));
// react-router-redux action to redirect
dispatch(redirectToList());
})
}
};
This is fine and does what I want, with one drawback: when STEPS_LIST_CHANGED action is called and step gets removed from the list, my component's mapStateToProps gets called before this redirect. Result is that mapStateToProps cannot obviously find this step anymore and my component gives me errors that step is undefined etc.
What I can do is to check if step provided to component is defined, and if not render nothing etc. But it's kind of defensive programming flavor I don't really like, as I don't want my component to know what to do if it gets wrong data.
I can also swap actions dispatch order: redirect first and then alter state, but then it doesn't feel right too (logically you first want to delete and then redirect).
How do you handle such cases?
EDIT:
What I ended up with was to put this null/undefined-check into container component (one that does redux wiring). With that approach I don't clutter my presentational components with unnecessary logic. It also can be abstracted out to higher order component (or ES7 decorator probably) to render null or <div></div> when some required props are not present.
I can think of two approaches:
Delegating the list changed to the redirect? For example:
dispatch(redirectToList(action(STEPS_LIST_CHANGED, {steps})));
Handling the null step component to ignore rendering:
shouldComponentUpdate: function() {
return this.state.steps != null;
}
You can change your return statement into an array
const mapStateToProps = (state, ownProps) => {
let stepId = ownProps.params.stepId;
let step = state.steps.find(s => s.id === stepId);
return step ? [{step}] : []
};
This way on your component you can do a step.map() and render it.
The problem you are facing is that you want an atomic action that will do both the deletion and redirect. This is not possible because the Redux store and URL are two separate states that cannot be updated in one run.
As a result, the user can see for a brief moment either:
an empty entity detail page before the redirect or
the deleted entity in the list after redirect.
One way to deal with that is to use React.memo (or shouldComponentUpdate) and prevent component re-render after entity has vanished:
const entityWasDeleted = (prevProps, nextProps) =>
prevProps.entity !== undefined && nextProps.entity === undefined
export default React.memo(EntityDetailComponent, entityWasDeleted)
It's a little bit hacky, because React.memo should not be used like this, but the component gets unmounted in the next step so who cares.

Firing Redux actions in response to route transitions in React Router

I am using react-router and redux in my latest app and I'm facing a couple of issues relating to state changes required based on the current url params and queries.
Basically I have a component that needs to update it's state every time the url changes. State is being passed in through props by redux with the decorator like so
#connect(state => ({
campaigngroups: state.jobresults.campaigngroups,
error: state.jobresults.error,
loading: state.jobresults.loading
}))
At the moment I am using the componentWillReceiveProps lifecycle method to respond to the url changes coming from react-router since react-router will pass new props to the handler when the url changes in this.props.params and this.props.query - the main issue with this approach is that I am firing an action in this method to update the state - which then goes and passes new props the component which will trigger the same lifecycle method again - so basically creating an endless loop, currently I am setting a state variable to stop this from happening.
componentWillReceiveProps(nextProps) {
if (this.state.shouldupdate) {
let { slug } = nextProps.params;
let { citizenships, discipline, workright, location } = nextProps.query;
const params = { slug, discipline, workright, location };
let filters = this._getFilters(params);
// set the state accroding to the filters in the url
this._setState(params);
// trigger the action to refill the stores
this.actions.loadCampaignGroups(filters);
}
}
Is there a standard approach to trigger actions base on route transitions OR can I have the state of the store directly connected to the state of the component instead of passing it in through props? I have tried to use willTransitionTo static method but I don't have access to the this.props.dispatch there.
Alright I eventually found an answer on the redux's github page so will post it here. Hope it saves somebody some pain.
#deowk There are two parts to this problem, I'd say. The first is that componentWillReceiveProps() is not an ideal way for responding to state changes — mostly because it forces you to think imperatively, instead of reactively like we do with Redux. The solution is to store your current router information (location, params, query) inside your store. Then all your state is in the same place, and you can subscribe to it using the same Redux API as the rest of your data.
The trick is to create an action type that fires whenever the router location changes. This is easy in the upcoming 1.0 version of React Router:
// routeLocationDidUpdate() is an action creator
// Only call it from here, nowhere else
BrowserHistory.listen(location => dispatch(routeLocationDidUpdate(location)));
Now your store state will always be in sync with the router state. That fixes the need to manually react to query param changes and setState() in your component above — just use Redux's Connector.
<Connector select={state => ({ filter: getFilters(store.router.params) })} />
The second part of the problem is you need a way to react to Redux state changes outside of the view layer, say to fire an action in response to a route change. You can continue to use componentWillReceiveProps for simple cases like the one you describe, if you wish.
For anything more complicated, though, I recommending using RxJS if you're open to it. This is exactly what observables are designed for — reactive data flow.
To do this in Redux, first create an observable sequence of store states. You can do this using rx's observableFromStore().
EDIT AS SUGGESTED BY CNP
import { Observable } from 'rx'
function observableFromStore(store) {
return Observable.create(observer =>
store.subscribe(() => observer.onNext(store.getState()))
)
}
Then it's just a matter of using observable operators to subscribe to specific state changes. Here's an example of re-directing from a login page after a successful login:
const didLogin$ = state$
.distinctUntilChanged(state => !state.loggedIn && state.router.path === '/login')
.filter(state => state.loggedIn && state.router.path === '/login');
didLogin$.subscribe({
router.transitionTo('/success');
});
This implementation is much simpler than the same functionality using imperative patterns like componentDidReceiveProps().
As mentioned before, the solution has two parts:
1) Link the routing information to the state
For that, all you have to do is to setup react-router-redux. Follow the instructions and you'll be fine.
After everything is set, you should have a routing state, like this:
2) Observe routing changes and trigger your actions
Somewhere in your code you should have something like this now:
// find this piece of code
export default function configureStore(initialState) {
// the logic for configuring your store goes here
let store = createStore(...);
// we need to bind the observer to the store <<here>>
}
What you want to do is to observe changes in the store, so you can dispatch actions when something changes.
As #deowk mentioned, you can use rx, or you can write your own observer:
reduxStoreObserver.js
var currentValue;
/**
* Observes changes in the Redux store and calls onChange when the state changes
* #param store The Redux store
* #param selector A function that should return what you are observing. Example: (state) => state.routing.locationBeforeTransitions;
* #param onChange A function called when the observable state changed. Params are store, previousValue and currentValue
*/
export default function observe(store, selector, onChange) {
if (!store) throw Error('\'store\' should be truthy');
if (!selector) throw Error('\'selector\' should be truthy');
store.subscribe(() => {
let previousValue = currentValue;
try {
currentValue = selector(store.getState());
}
catch(ex) {
// the selector could not get the value. Maybe because of a null reference. Let's assume undefined
currentValue = undefined;
}
if (previousValue !== currentValue) {
onChange(store, previousValue, currentValue);
}
});
}
Now, all you have to do is to use the reduxStoreObserver.js we just wrote to observe changes:
import observe from './reduxStoreObserver.js';
export default function configureStore(initialState) {
// the logic for configuring your store goes here
let store = createStore(...);
observe(store,
//if THIS changes, we the CALLBACK will be called
state => state.routing.locationBeforeTransitions.search,
(store, previousValue, currentValue) => console.log('Some property changed from ', previousValue, 'to', currentValue)
);
}
The above code makes our function to be called every time locationBeforeTransitions.search changes in the state (as a result of the user navigating). If you want, you can observe que query string and so forth.
If you want to trigger an action as a result of routing changes, all you have to do is store.dispatch(yourAction) inside the handler.

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