2003 React Router Prework.md

React Router Prework

This gist contains a short assignment I'd like everyone to complete before our formal lesson. The prework involves reading some of the React Router documentation, and will allow us to keep the lesson more hands on.

Instructions

1. Fork this gist
2. On your own copy, go through the listed readings and answer associated questions
3. Comment a link to your forked copy on the original gist

Questions / Readings

Router Overview

React Router is a library that allows us to make our single page React applications mimic the behavior of multipage apps. It provides the ability to use browser history, allowing users to navigate with forward / back buttons and bookmark links to specific views of the app. Most modern sites use some form of routing. React Router exposes this functionality through a series of components. Let's start by looking at the overall structure of an app using router:

1. Take a look at the quick start page of the React Router docs. Take note of the syntax and organization of the page. No worries if this looks unclear right now! (nothing to answer here)

2. What package do we need to install to use React Router?

• run 'npm install react-router-dom' in the terminal

Router Components

React Router provides a series of helpful components that allow our apps to use routing. These can be split into roughly 3 categories:

• Routers
• Route Matcher
• Route Changers

Routers

Any code that uses a React-Router-provided component must be wrapped in a router component. There are lots of router components we can use, but we'll focus on one in particular. Let's look into the docs to learn more.

3. What is a <BrowserRouter />?

• A type of router that uses data collected from an API in order to update what is rendered on the page. This data can be updated and manipulated by changing the state.

4. Why would we use <BrowserRouter /> in our apps?

• When a user navigates to a different component of the page, the url updates accordingly. For example, if a user wants to know what the login page address, it is easy to use if it is http://www.example.com/login.

Route Matchers

5. What does the <Route /> component do?

• Renders the DOM in a unique way based on what is in the url. If the route is /login, then it should render just the login page.

6. How does the <Route /> component check whether it should render something?

• The <Route /> component checks its defined path and renders accordingly. In the above example, the path would be defined as /login.

7. What does the <Switch /> component do?

• Will only render the first child component that exactly matches the path. This is different from <Route /> as that will accept a partial match.

8. How does it decide what to render?

• It finds the first path that is an exact match.

Route Changers

9. What does the <Link /> component do? How does a user interact with it?

• Provides a file path for when a user interacts with the link, allowing them to navigate across the app.

10. What does the <NavLink /> component do? How does a user interact with it?

• Similar to <Link />, but it allows developers to add unique styles within the JSX.

11. What does the <Redirect /> component do?

• Used when getting a 3xx network response, navigates the user to an alternate location.