Necto

Necto compliments Redux by providing a composable, declarative api to create flows through redux (Action -> Reducer or Action -> Saga). The intent of Necto is to reduce boilerplate, simplify and standardize action creators, and group action logic so that your team can write and build new features in Redux faster and more efficienly at scale.

Key Goals

• It should work alongside an existing Redux implementation.
• It should work with Redux Devtools.
• Action creators should still uphold the Three Principles of Redux and follow Flux Standard Action patterns.
• Action creators should describe a behavior or a user interaction, but make sure the business logic of the implementation is still traceable and reusable.
• Dispatching an action method should be consistent and every action should take the same arguments.
• Reduce the amount of boilerplate needed to build new slices of state and write new features.
• Radically simplify asynchronous flows and remove the painful setup of sagas.
• Actions should only ever trigger a single side effect - A reducer or a saga.

How does Necto solve these issues?

In the wild west of Redux land, there are many ways to structure your Redux project. The following is the most basic and likely most commonly used method of structuring a redux action, reducer, and asynchronous saga.

Old Way

// users/index
import Constants from './constants';
import * as Actions from './actions';
import Reducer from './reducer';
import Sagas from './sagas';

// users/constants.js
export default {
  SOME_ACTION: 'USERS/SOME_ACTION',
  SOME_OTHER_ASYNC_ACTION: 'USERS/SOME_OTHER_ASYNC_ACTION',
};

// users/actions.js
import Constants from './constants';
export const someAction = foo => ({
  type: Constants.SOME_ACTION,
  foo,
});
 
export const someOtherAsyncAction = bar => ({
  type: Constants.SOME_OTHER_ASYNC_ACTION,
  bar,
});

// users/reducer.js
import Constants from './constants';
 
const INITIAL_STATE = {
  foo: 'bar',
  bar: 'foo',
};
 
export default (state = INITIAL_STATE, action) => {
  switch (action.type) {
    case Constants.SOME_ACTION:
      return {
        ...state,
        foo: action.foo,
      };
    default:
      return state;
  }
};

// users/sagas.js
import regeneratorRuntime from 'regenerator-runtime';
import { put } from 'redux-saga/effects';
import Constants from './constants';
 
function* someOtherAsyncAction(action) {
  try {
    let { bar } = action;
    // Some saga logic here
  } catch (e) {}
}
 
export function* watchSomeOtherAsyncAction() {
  yield takeEvery(Constants.SOME_OTHER_ASYNC_ACTION, someOtherAsyncAction);
}
 
export default all([fork(watchSomeOtherAsyncAction)]);

Necto Way

Creating a Necto Instance

import Necto from 'necto';
 
const users = new Necto('users', {
  initialState: {
    foo: 'bar',
    bar: 'foo',
  },
});
 
users.createFlow(
  'someAction',
  (state, action) => ({
    ...state,
    foo: action.payload.foo,
  }),
  {
    requiredParams: {
      payload: ['foo'],
      meta: null,
    },
  }
);
 
users.createFlow(
  'someOtherAsyncAction',
  function*(action) {
    try {
      let { bar } = action.payload;
      // Any saga logic here
      console.log('What data?', bar);
    } catch (e) {}
  },
  {
    requiredParams: {
      payload: ['bar'],
    },
  }
);

Using a Necto Instance

import users from './path-to-users-necto';
 
store.dispatch(
  users.Actions.someAction(
    'User clicked some button',
    { foo: 'someFooChange' },
    { someMeta: 'someMeta' }
  )
);
/*
  Dispatched Action 
 
  {
    payload: {
      foo: 'someFooChange',
    },
    meta: {
      someMeta: 'someMeta',
    },
    type: '[USERS/SOME_ACTION] User clicked some button',
    _actionType: 'USERS/SOME_ACTION',
    _interaction: 'User clicked some button',
    _requiredParams: {
      payload: ['foo'],
      meta: null
    }
  }
 
  Next State
  {
    foo: 'someFooChange',
    bar: 'foo',
  }
*/
 
store.dispatch(
  users.Actions.someOtherAsyncAction('User fetched some data', {
    bar: 'some data!',
  })
);
/*
  Dispatched Action 
 
  {
    payload: {
      bar: 'some data!'
    },
    meta: undefined,
    type: '[USERS/SOME_OTHER_ASYNC_ACTION] User fetched some data',
    _actionType: 'USERS/SOME_OTHER_ASYNC_ACTION',
    _interaction: 'User fetched some data',
    _requiredParams: {
      payload: ['bar'],
      meta: null
    }
  }
 
  Console
 
  : What data? some data
 
*/

---

Use

Install

$ npm install --save necto

Using Necto With Redux

// store/some_model.js
const someModel = new Necto('someModel');
export default someModel;

Connecting to Your Store

// store/combine_reducers.js
import { combineReducers } from 'redux';
 
import SomeModel from './some_model';
 
export default combineReducers({
  // other reducers
  ...SomeModel.getReducers(), // returns {'someModel': someModel.Reducers}
  // other reducers (even non-necto!) reducers
});
 
/*
  Store at @@INIT is
  {
    someModel: initialState
  }
*/

Connecting to Your Saga Middleware

// store/combine_sagas.js
import regeneratorRuntime from 'regenerator-runtime';
import { all } from 'redux-saga/effects';
 
import SomeModel from './some_model';
 
export default function* rootSaga() {
  yield all([
    // other sagas
    SomeModel.getSagas(),
    // other sagas
  ]);
}

---

Concepts

Reducer Key / Reducer Slice / Name

• This key or name is the slice of the store that sits on the top level

Flow

• A flow is an action => flowPath combination
• Flows are analogous to a redux action and can be dispatched just like a Redux action, however they imply that based on an action, one of two things occur: 1) A reducer updates some part of the store or 2) An asynchronous saga is started

Flow Path

• A flow path is either a reducer function or an asynchronous saga function.

Saga

• An asynchronous path that is triggered from the dispatch of an action
• https://redux-saga.js.org/
• Necto mostly makes use of takeEvery and takeLatest in redux-saga, however also lets you specify your own "watcher" function to customize any saga flows.

---

API

new Necto(name, [options])

Arguments

• name (String): Name of your reducer key
• [options] (Object):
  • initialState (any): The initial state for this slice of the store

createFlow(name, flowPath, [options])

Arguments

• name (String): Action function name (only valid function names allowed)

• flowPath (Function): defined as either function (state, action) OR function*(action). Necto checks the actual names of the arguments that are passed into this function and decides what type of flow path to create. e.g. function (a, b) will throw an error on flow creation.

  1. Reducer Function: Takes the paramters (state, action) and should return a new slice of the state
  2. Saga Generator Function: Takes the parameter (action), should be a generator function (function*() {}) and can handle any asynchronous code that a normal saga function can.

• [options] (Object): Optional

  • requiredParams (Object or Array {String} or Function):
    • payload (Array {String}): Any required payload parameters specified as dot-notation, like lodash.get. Validates if key exists and is not null or undefined.
    • meta (Array {String}): Any required meta parameters specified as dot-notation, like lodash.get. Validates if key exists and is not null or undefined.
    • ** requiredParams can also be provided as an array of strings or a function that returns any of these options
      • ['payload.foo','meta.bar']
      • (action) => { if (action.foo) return ['payload.bar']}

  • interactionRequired (Boolean): Optional

// Object pattern
necto.createFlow('name', flowPath, {
  requiredParams: {
    payload: ['test'],
  },
});
 
// Array pattern
necto.createFlow('name', flowPath, {
  requiredParams: ['payload.test'],
});
 
// Function pattern
necto.createFlow('name', flowPath, {
  requiredParams: action => {
    return action.meta.foo && action.meta.bar ? ['payload.bang'] : null;
  },
});

---

Other

What does Necto mean?

Verb nectō (present infinitive nectere, perfect active nexī, supine nexum); third conjugation

1. I bind, tie, fasten, connect, interweave, attach; unite; relate.
2. I bind by obligation, oblige, make liable.
3. I contrive, devise, compose, produce.

Future Plans

• TODO...