Granularity of Reuse

What should be the granularity of reuse in React code base?

The granularity of reuse in a React codebase can vary quite a bit depending on the needs of your application. It’s typically a balancing act between reusability and maintainability. There are a few key principles to consider:

  1. Single Responsibility Principle: Ideally, a component should have one responsibility. If a component has more than one responsibility, it becomes more difficult to maintain and reuse. When a component only does one thing, it’s more likely that it can be reused wherever that thing needs to be done.

  2. Don’t Over-Abstract Early: It’s easy to want to make everything reusable from the beginning, but premature abstraction can lead to complex components that are hard to understand and maintain. It’s generally better to wait until you see patterns repeating in your codebase before abstracting them into reusable components. The rule of three is a good guideline here: consider abstraction when you’re repeating the same code three times.

  3. Keep UI and Business Logic Separate: UI components (buttons, inputs, cards, etc.) are often very reusable, because they don’t contain any specific business logic. They simply take props and render based on those props. On the other hand, components that contain business logic may be less reusable, because they’re tied to specific business rules.

  4. Higher-Order Components and Render Props: These are techniques in React for reusing component logic. Higher-Order Components are functions that take a component and return a new component with additional props or behavior. Render props are a way of sharing code between React components using a prop whose value is a function.

  5. Custom Hooks: Hooks are another way to extract reusable logic in React. For instance, if you find yourself using the same side effects in different components, you could abstract that logic into a custom hook.

  6. Reuse Styles: With CSS modules or CSS-in-JS solutions, you can also make your styles reusable. These can be applied across different components for consistent look and feel.

In summary, the level of reuse really depends on the specific needs of your project. As a general rule, aim for a level of abstraction that reduces repetition and increases readability and maintainability, but avoid over-abstraction, which can make your code more complex and harder to manage.