React And Redux: Using State Or Refs?
I'm currently teaching my self Redux. For this purpose I created a simple Todo application. Now on this application I'm currently at the process of using dispatch()
to put a todo into my store. This is a question about your opinion. I want to avoid code smell.
I found two ways of achieving this. One using state
and one using ref
. I was wondering which way is better? Thank you for any advice. The two versions are below.
Version one using ref
:
import React, { Component } from "react";
import Todo from "./Todo";
import { connect } from "react-redux";
import { ADD_TODO } from "./actionCreators";
class TodoList extends Component {
taskRef = React.createRef();
handleSubmit = event => {
event.preventDefault();
this.props.dispatch({
type: ADD_TODO,
task: this.taskRef.current.value
});
event.currentTarget.reset();
};
render() {
let todos = this.props.todos.map((val, index) => (
<Todo task={val.task} key={index} />
));
return (
<div>
<form onSubmit={this.handleSubmit}>
<label htmlFor="task">Task </label>
<input type="text" name="task" id="task" ref={this.taskRef} />
<button type="submit">Add a Todo!</button>
</form>
<ul>{todos}</ul>
</div>
);
}
}
const mapDispatchToProps = state => ({
todos: state.todos
});
export default connect(mapDispatchToProps)(TodoList);
And here is the second version using state
:
import React, { Component } from "react";
import Todo from "./Todo";
import { connect } from "react-redux";
import { ADD_TODO } from "./actionCreators";
class TodoList extends Component {
state = {
task: ""
};
handleSubmit = event => {
event.preventDefault();
this.props.dispatch({
type: ADD_TODO,
task: this.state.task
});
event.target.reset();
};
handleChange = event => {
event.persist();
this.setState((state, props) => ({
[event.target.name]: event.target.value
}));
};
render() {
let todos = this.props.todos.map((val, index) => (
<Todo task={val.task} key={index} />
));
return (
<div>
<form onSubmit={this.handleSubmit}>
<label htmlFor="task">Task </label>
<input
type="text"
name="task"
id="task"
onChange={this.handleChange}
/>
<button type="submit">Add a Todo!</button>
</form>
<ul>{todos}</ul>
</div>
);
}
}
const mapDispatchToProps = state => ({
todos: state.todos
});
export default connect(mapDispatchToProps)(TodoList);
EDIT: As qasimalbaqali pointed out in the comments here is a similar post on stackoverflow. I'm still unsure, because the first answer says refs are bad with reasons, the second one says React Devs say refs are awesome for grabbing values from the dom (which is what I'm doing!).
Answer
Thank you for anyone helping. It seems like a majority of the community is in favor of using state.
I also asked Dan Abramov, who said that he'd prefer a ref in this case. You can see his answer here.
Thank you everyone for your input and advice! :)
Related Questions
- → Import statement and Babel
- → should I choose reactjs+f7 or f7+vue.js?
- → Uncaught TypeError: Cannot read property '__SECRET_DOM_DO_NOT_USE_OR_YOU_WILL_BE_FIRED' of undefined
- → .tsx webpack compile fails: Unexpected token <
- → React-router: Passing props to children
- → ListView.DataSource looping data for React Native
- → React Native with visual studio 2015 IDE
- → Can't test submit handler in React component
- → React + Flux - How to avoid global variable
- → Webpack, React & Babel, not rendering DOM
- → How do I determine if a new ReactJS session and/or Browser session has started?
- → Alt @decorators in React-Native
- → How to dynamically add class to parent div of focused input field?