react-use-fetch-with-redux

React hook to fetch/select data with simple caching

This hook is for you if you...

• Want to feed a component data from Redux ✅
• Don't want to make API calls if you already have the data ✅
• Love hooks ✅

Installation

With NPM:

npm i --save react-use-fetch-with-redux

With Yarn:

yarn add react-use-fetch-with-redux

API

useFetchWithRedux is a function that takes three parameters:

• getDataStart: This is a function that returns a Redux action (i.e. an action creator) that must kickstart your data fetching process (i.e. the handler for this action could make an API call and store the result of that in your Redux store).
• selector: This is a function that takes your Redux state and returns the slice of state you are returning from your hook. If the selector returns null, then your getDataStart action will be dispatched.
• options: This is a configuration object that allows cache settings to be configured.

How it works

• You provide an action creator (getDataStart)
• You provide a selector (selector)
• You provide an optional cache config (options)

If you have not provided a cache config:

• If your selector returns null, then the action your action creator returns will be dispatched. It is up to you to provide the logic in your selectors to know when to return null.
• If your selector returns data, then your action creator is not called and the hook will simply return that data from state.

If you have provided a cache config:

• If your selector returns data and cache timeout hasn't been reached, then your action creator is not called and the hook will simply return data from state.
• If your selector returns data and cache timeout has been reached, then the action your action creator returns will be dispatched.

Usage

You can create your own hook that uses useFetchWithRedux to grab data (if needed) and pass it from the Redux store to your components:

In useThing.ts

import { useFetchWithRedux } from 'react-use-fetch-with-redux';
import { getThingStart } from './actions/ThingActions'; // getThingStart is an action creator.
import { getThingSelector } from './selectors/ThingSelector'; // getThingSelector is a selector.
 
const useThing = () => useFetchWithRedux(getThingStart, getThingSelector);
 
export { useThing };

For completeness, this is what getThingSelector could look like:

In ./selectors/ThingSelector.ts

import { State } from './types'; // This is the Redux Store type
 
const getThingSelector = (state: State) =>
  state.thing === [] ? null : state.thing;
 
export { getThingSelector };

Finally, piecing it all together, we can now elegantly use our hook in a component.

In SomeComponent.tsx

import React from 'react';
import { useThing } from './useThing';
import { State, Thing } from './types';
 
const SomeComponent = () => {
  const thing = useThing<State, Thing>();
  const Loading = () => <span>Loading...</span>;
 
  return thing ? <Loading /> : <div>My thing: {thing}</div>;
};

Additional features

Caching

There is the option to invalidate the cache, meaning next time the hook is called it will fetch the data again.

By setting a timeTillCacheInvalidate time (in ms), as follows:

In SomeHighLevelComponent.tsx

import React from 'react';
import { Provider } from 'react-redux';
import { store } from './redux/store';
 
const SomeComponent = () => {
  <Provider store={store}>
    <ReactUseFetchWithReduxProvider timeTillCacheInvalidate={1800000}>
      <App />
    </ReactUseFetchWithReduxProvider>
  </Provider>;
};

Will result in the cache invalidating after 30 minutes. There is also the option to set the cache invalidation time per hook, with an optional third parameter like:

In useThing.ts

import { useFetchWithRedux } from 'react-use-fetch-with-redux';
import { getThingStart } from './actions/ThingActions'; // getThingStart is an action creator.
import { getThingSelector } from './selectors/ThingSelector'; // getThingSelector is a selector.
 
const useThing = () =>
  useFetchWithRedux(getThingStart, getThingSelector, {
    timeTillCacheInvalidate: 1800000,
  });
 
export { useThing };

This will override any value set by the provider. You can also not set any value at the provider level, and handle all invalidation times in the hooks, but you will still need the provider, just with no value:

In SomeHighLevelComponent.tsx

import React from 'react';
import { Provider } from 'react-redux';
import { store } from './redux/store';
 
const SomeComponent = () => {
  <Provider store={store}>
    <ReactUseFetchWithReduxProvider>
      <App />
    </ReactUseFetchWithReduxProvider>
  </Provider>;
};

In useThing.ts

import { useFetchWithRedux } from 'react-use-fetch-with-redux';
import { getThingStart } from './actions/ThingActions'; // getThingStart is an action creator.
import { getThingSelector } from './selectors/ThingSelector'; // getThingSelector is a selector.
 
const useThing = () =>
  useFetchWithRedux(getThingStart, getThingSelector, {
    timeTillCacheInvalidate: 1800000,
  });
 
export { useThing };

Gotchas

A lower cache timeout value will always take precedence. For example if we have:

• timeTillCacheInvalidate at the Provider level is 10000 (10 seconds)
• We call the hook with a timeTillCacheInvalidate of 5000 (5 seconds)

Then the cache timeout will be 5 seconds for the individual instance of that hook. This is what that looks like in code:

In SomeHighLevelComponent.tsx

import React from 'react';
import { Provider } from 'react-redux';
import { store } from './redux/store';
 
const SomeComponent = () => {
  <Provider store={store}>
    <ReactUseFetchWithReduxProvider timeTillCacheInvalidate={10000}>
      <App />
    </ReactUseFetchWithReduxProvider>
  </Provider>;
};

In useThing.ts

import { useFetchWithRedux } from 'react-use-fetch-with-redux';
import { getThingStart } from './actions/ThingActions'; // getThingStart is an action creator.
import { getThingSelector } from './selectors/ThingSelector'; // getThingSelector is a selector.
 
const useThing = () =>
  useFetchWithRedux(getThingStart, getThingSelector, {
    timeTillCacheInvalidate: 5000,
  });
 
export { useThing };

Testing

The project uses Jest for testing, along with react-hooks-testing-library for rendering hooks without explicitly creating harness components.

Contributing

I welcome all contributions to this project. Please feel free to raise any issues or pull requests as you see fit :)

Future features

There are many things that could improve this hook, so keep your eyes peeled or feel free to contribute :)

Possible features include:

• More sophisticated caching strategies