We will build a small game during this tutorial. **You might be tempted to skip it because you're not building games -- but give it a chance.** The techniques you'll learn in the tutorial are fundamental to building any React app, and mastering it will give you a deep understanding of React.
>This tutorial is designed for people who prefer to **learn by doing**. If you prefer learning concepts from the ground up, check out our [step-by-step guide](/docs/hello-world.html). You might find this tutorial and the guide complementary to each other.
You don't have to complete all of the sections at once to get the value out of this tutorial. Try to get as far as you can -- even if it's one or two sections.
You can see what we'll be building here: **[Final Result](https://codepen.io/gaearon/pen/gWWZgR?editors=0010)**. If the code doesn't make sense to you, or if you are unfamiliar with the code's syntax, don't worry! The goal of this tutorial is to help you understand React and its syntax.
We recommend that you check out the tic-tac-toe game before continuing with the tutorial. One of the features that you'll notice is that there is a numbered list to the right of the game's board. This list gives you a history of all of the moves that have occurred in the game, and it is updated as the game progresses.
You can close the tic-tac-toe game once you're familiar with it. We'll be starting from a simpler template in this tutorial. Our next step is to set you up so that you can start building the game.
We'll assume that you have some familiarity with HTML and JavaScript, but you should be able to follow along even if you're coming from a different programming language. We'll also assume that you're familiar with programming concepts like functions, objects, arrays, and to a lesser extent, classes.
If you need to review JavaScript, we recommend reading [this guide](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/A_re-introduction_to_JavaScript). Note that we're also using some features from ES6 -- a recent version of JavaScript. In this tutorial, we're using [arrow functions](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Functions/Arrow_functions), [classes](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Classes), [`let`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Statements/let), and [`const`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Statements/const) statements. You can use the [Babel REPL](babel://es5-syntax-example) to check what ES6 code compiles to.
There are two ways to complete this tutorial: you can either write the code in your browser, or you can set up a local development environment on your computer.
First, open this **[Starter Code](https://codepen.io/gaearon/pen/oWWQNa?editors=0010)** in a new tab. The new tab should display an empty tic-tac-toe game board and React code. We will be editing the React code in this tutorial.
>**Don't delete the entire `src` folder, just the original source files inside it.** We'll replace the default source files with examples for this project in the next step.
If you get stuck, check out the [community support resources](/community/support.html). In particular, [Reactiflux Chat](https://discord.gg/reactiflux) is a great way to get help quickly. If you don't receive an answer, or if you remain stuck, please file an issue, and we'll help you out.
React is a declarative, efficient, and flexible JavaScript library for building user interfaces. It lets you compose complex UIs from small and isolated pieces of code called "components".
We'll get to the funny XML-like tags soon. We use components to tell React what we want to see on the screen. When our data changes, React will efficiently update and re-render our components.
Here, ShoppingList is a **React component class**, or **React component type**. A component takes in parameters, called `props` (short for "properties"), and returns a hierarchy of views to display via the `render` method.
The `render` method returns a *description* of what you want to see on the screen. React takes the description and displays the result. In particular, `render` returns a **React element**, which is a lightweight description of what to render. Most React developers use a special syntax called "JSX" which makes these structures easier to write. The `<div />` syntax is transformed at build time to `React.createElement('div')`. The example above is equivalent to:
If you're curious, `createElement()` is described in more detail in the [API reference](/docs/react-api.html#createelement), but we won't be using it in this tutorial. Instead, we will keep using JSX.
JSX comes with the full power of JavaScript. You can put *any* JavaScript expressions within braces inside JSX. Each React element is a JavaScript object that you can store in a variable or pass around in your program.
The `ShoppingList` component above only renders built-in DOM components like `<div />` and `<li />`. But you can compose and render custom React components too. For example, we can now refer to the whole shopping list by writing `<ShoppingList />`. Each React component is encapsulated and can operate independently; this allows you to build complex UIs from simple components.
If you're going to work on the tutorial **in your browser,** open this code in a new tab: **[Starter Code](https://codepen.io/gaearon/pen/oWWQNa?editors=0010)**. If you're going to work on the tutorial **locally,** instead open `src/index.js` in your project folder (you have already touched this file during the [setup](#setup-option-2-local-development-environment)).
This Starter Code is the base of what we're building. We've provided the CSS styling so that you only need to focus on learning React and programming the tic-tac-toe game.
The Square component renders a single `<button>` and the Board renders 9 squares. The Game component renders a board with placeholder values which we'll modify later. There are currently no interactive components.
To get our feet wet, let's try passing some data from our Board component to our Square component.
We strongly recommend typing code by hand as you're working through the tutorial and not using copy/paste. This will help you develop muscle memory and a stronger understanding.
Congratulations! You've just "passed a prop" from a parent Board component to a child Square component. Passing props is how information flows in React apps, from parents to children.
>To save typing and avoid the [confusing behavior of `this`](https://yehudakatz.com/2011/08/11/understanding-javascript-function-invocation-and-this/), we will use the [arrow function syntax](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Functions/Arrow_functions) for event handlers here and further below:
>Notice how with `onClick={() => console.log('click')}`, we're passing *a function* as the `onClick` prop. React will only call this function after a click. Forgetting `() =>` and writing `onClick={console.log('click')}` is a common mistake, and would fire every time the component re-renders.
As a next step, we want the Square component to "remember" that it got clicked, and fill it with an "X" mark. To "remember" things, components use **state**.
React components can have state by setting `this.state` in their constructors. `this.state` should be considered as private to a React component that it's defined in. Let's store the current value of the Square in `this.state`, and change it when the Square is clicked.
>In [JavaScript classes](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Classes), you need to always call `super` when defining the constructor of a subclass. All React component classes that have a `constructor` should start with a `super(props)` call.
By calling `this.setState` from an `onClick` handler in the Square's `render` method, we tell React to re-render that Square whenever its `<button>` is clicked. After the update, the Square's `this.state.value` will be `'X'`, so we'll see the `X` on the game board. If you click on any Square, an `X` should show up.
The React Devtools extension for [Chrome](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/react-developer-tools/fmkadmapgofadopljbjfkapdkoienihi?hl=en) and [Firefox](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/react-devtools/) lets you inspect a React component tree with your browser's developer tools.
After installing React DevTools, you can right-click on any element on the page, click "Inspect" to open the developer tools, and the React tabs ("⚛️ Components" and "⚛️ Profiler") will appear as the last tabs to the right. Use "⚛️ Components" to inspect the component tree.
We now have the basic building blocks for our tic-tac-toe game. To have a complete game, we now need to alternate placing "X"s and "O"s on the board, and we need a way to determine a winner.
We may think that Board should just ask each Square for the Square's state. Although this approach is possible in React, we discourage it because the code becomes difficult to understand, susceptible to bugs, and hard to refactor. Instead, the best approach is to store the game's state in the parent Board component instead of in each Square. The Board component can tell each Square what to display by passing a prop, [just like we did when we passed a number to each Square](#passing-data-through-props).
**To collect data from multiple children, or to have two child components communicate with each other, you need to declare the shared state in their parent component instead. The parent component can pass the state back down to the children by using props; this keeps the child components in sync with each other and with the parent component.**
In the beginning, we [passed the `value` prop down](#passing-data-through-props) from the Board to show numbers from 0 to 8 in every Square. In a different previous step, we replaced the numbers with an "X" mark [determined by Square's own state](#making-an-interactive-component). This is why Square currently ignores the `value` prop passed to it by the Board.
We will now use the prop passing mechanism again. We will modify the Board to instruct each individual Square about its current value (`'X'`, `'O'`, or `null`). We have already defined the `squares` array in the Board's constructor, and we will modify the Board's `renderSquare` method to read from it:
Next, we need to change what happens when a Square is clicked. The Board component now maintains which squares are filled. We need to create a way for the Square to update the Board's state. Since state is considered to be private to a component that defines it, we cannot update the Board's state directly from Square.
Instead, we'll pass down a function from the Board to the Square, and we'll have Square call that function when a square is clicked. We'll change the `renderSquare` method in Board to:
>We split the returned element into multiple lines for readability, and added parentheses so that JavaScript doesn't insert a semicolon after `return` and break our code.
Now we're passing down two props from Board to Square: `value` and `onClick`. The `onClick` prop is a function that Square can call when clicked. We'll make the following changes to Square:
5. We have not defined the `handleClick()` method yet, so our code crashes. If you click a square now, you should see a red error screen saying something like "this.handleClick is not a function".
>The DOM `<button>` element's `onClick` attribute has a special meaning to React because it is a built-in component. For custom components like Square, the naming is up to you. We could give any name to the Square's `onClick` prop or Board's `handleClick` method, and the code would work the same. In React, it's conventional to use `on[Event]` names for props which represent events and `handle[Event]` for the methods which handle the events.
After these changes, we're again able to click on the Squares to fill them, the same as we had before. However, now the state is stored in the Board component instead of the individual Square components. When the Board's state changes, the Square components re-render automatically. Keeping the state of all squares in the Board component will allow it to determine the winner in the future.
Since the Square components no longer maintain state, the Square components receive values from the Board component and inform the Board component when they're clicked. In React terms, the Square components are now **controlled components**. The Board has full control over them.
Note how in `handleClick`, we call `.slice()` to create a copy of the `squares` array to modify instead of modifying the existing array. We will explain why we create a copy of the `squares` array in the next section.
In the previous code example, we suggested that you create a copy of the `squares` array using the `slice()` method instead of modifying the existing array. We'll now discuss immutability and why immutability is important to learn.
There are generally two approaches to changing data. The first approach is to *mutate* the data by directly changing the data's values. The second approach is to replace the data with a new copy which has the desired changes.
Immutability makes complex features much easier to implement. Later in this tutorial, we will implement a "time travel" feature that allows us to review the tic-tac-toe game's history and "jump back" to previous moves. This functionality isn't specific to games -- an ability to undo and redo certain actions is a common requirement in applications. Avoiding direct data mutation lets us keep previous versions of the game's history intact, and reuse them later.
Detecting changes in mutable objects is difficult because they are modified directly. This detection requires the mutable object to be compared to previous copies of itself and the entire object tree to be traversed.
Detecting changes in immutable objects is considerably easier. If the immutable object that is being referenced is different than the previous one, then the object has changed.
The main benefit of immutability is that it helps you build _pure components_ in React. Immutable data can easily determine if changes have been made, which helps to determine when a component requires re-rendering.
You can learn more about `shouldComponentUpdate()` and how you can build *pure components* by reading [Optimizing Performance](/docs/optimizing-performance.html#examples).
In React, **function components** are a simpler way to write components that only contain a `render` method and don't have their own state. Instead of defining a class which extends `React.Component`, we can write a function that takes `props` as input and returns what should be rendered. Function components are less tedious to write than classes, and many components can be expressed this way.
>When we modified the Square to be a function component, we also changed `onClick={() => this.props.onClick()}` to a shorter `onClick={props.onClick}` (note the lack of parentheses on *both* sides).
Each time a player moves, `xIsNext` (a boolean) will be flipped to determine which player goes next and the game's state will be saved. We'll update the Board's `handleClick` function to flip the value of `xIsNext`:
Now that we show which player's turn is next, we should also show when the game is won and there are no more turns to make. Copy this helper function and paste it at the end of the file:
We will call `calculateWinner(squares)` in the Board's `render` function to check if a player has won. If a player has won, we can display text such as "Winner: X" or "Winner: O". We'll replace the `status` declaration in Board's `render` function with this code:
However, we used `slice()` to create a new copy of the `squares` array after every move, and [treated it as immutable](#why-immutability-is-important). This will allow us to store every past version of the `squares` array, and navigate between the turns that have already happened.
We'll store the past `squares` arrays in another array called `history`. The `history` array represents all board states, from the first to the last move, and has a shape like this:
We'll want the top-level Game component to display a list of past moves. It will need access to the `history` to do that, so we will place the `history` state in the top-level Game component.
Placing the `history` state into the Game component lets us remove the `squares` state from its child Board component. Just like we ["lifted state up"](#lifting-state-up) from the Square component into the Board component, we are now lifting it up from the Board into the top-level Game component. This gives the Game component full control over the Board's data, and lets it instruct the Board to render previous turns from the `history`.
Next, we'll have the Board component receive `squares` and `onClick` props from the Game component. Since we now have a single click handler in Board for many Squares, we'll need to pass the location of each Square into the `onClick` handler to indicate which Square was clicked. Here are the required steps to transform the Board component:
Since the Game component is now rendering the game's status, we can remove the corresponding code from the Board's `render` method. After refactoring, the Board's `render` function looks like this:
Finally, we need to move the `handleClick` method from the Board component to the Game component. We also need to modify `handleClick` because the Game component's state is structured differently. Within the Game's `handleClick` method, we concatenate new history entries onto `history`.
>Unlike the array `push()` method you might be more familiar with, the `concat()` method doesn't mutate the original array, so we prefer it.
At this point, the Board component only needs the `renderSquare` and `render` methods. The game's state and the `handleClick` method should be in the Game component.
We learned earlier that React elements are first-class JavaScript objects; we can pass them around in our applications. To render multiple items in React, we can use an array of React elements.
In JavaScript, arrays have a [`map()` method](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Array/map) that is commonly used for mapping data to other data, for example:
Using the `map` method, we can map our history of moves to React elements representing buttons on the screen, and display a list of buttons to "jump" to past moves.
Let's `map` over the `history` in the Game's `render` method:
As we iterate through `history` array, `step` variable refers to the current `history` element value, and `move` refers to the current `history` element index. We are only interested in `move` here, hence `step` is not getting assigned to anything.
For each move in the tic-tac-toe game's history, we create a list item `<li>` which contains a button `<button>`. The button has a `onClick` handler which calls a method called `this.jumpTo()`. We haven't implemented the `jumpTo()` method yet. For now, we should see a list of the moves that have occurred in the game and a warning in the developer tools console that says:
When we render a list, React stores some information about each rendered list item. When we update a list, React needs to determine what has changed. We could have added, removed, re-arranged, or updated the list's items.
In addition to the updated counts, a human reading this would probably say that we swapped Alexa and Ben's ordering and inserted Claudia between Alexa and Ben. However, React is a computer program and does not know what we intended. Because React cannot know our intentions, we need to specify a *key* property for each list item to differentiate each list item from its siblings. One option would be to use the strings `alexa`, `ben`, `claudia`. If we were displaying data from a database, Alexa, Ben, and Claudia's database IDs could be used as keys.
When a list is re-rendered, React takes each list item's key and searches the previous list's items for a matching key. If the current list has a key that didn't exist before, React creates a component. If the current list is missing a key that existed in the previous list, React destroys the previous component. If two keys match, the corresponding component is moved. Keys tell React about the identity of each component which allows React to maintain state between re-renders. If a component's key changes, the component will be destroyed and re-created with a new state.
`key` is a special and reserved property in React (along with `ref`, a more advanced feature). When an element is created, React extracts the `key` property and stores the key directly on the returned element. Even though `key` may look like it belongs in `props`, `key` cannot be referenced using `this.props.key`. React automatically uses `key` to decide which components to update. A component cannot inquire about its `key`.
**It's strongly recommended that you assign proper keys whenever you build dynamic lists.** If you don't have an appropriate key, you may want to consider restructuring your data so that you do.
If no key is specified, React will present a warning and use the array index as a key by default. Using the array index as a key is problematic when trying to re-order a list's items or inserting/removing list items. Explicitly passing `key={i}` silences the warning but has the same problems as array indices and is not recommended in most cases.
In the tic-tac-toe game's history, each past move has a unique ID associated with it: it's the sequential number of the move. The moves are never re-ordered, deleted, or inserted in the middle, so it's safe to use the move index as a key.
In the Game component's `render` method, we can add the key as `<li key={move}>` and React's warning about keys should disappear:
Clicking any of the list item's buttons throws an error because the `jumpTo` method is undefined. Before we implement `jumpTo`, we'll add `stepNumber` to the Game component's state to indicate which step we're currently viewing.
Next, we'll define the `jumpTo` method in Game to update that `stepNumber`. We also set `xIsNext` to true if the number that we're changing `stepNumber` to is even:
Notice in `jumpTo` method, we haven't updated `history` property of the state. That is because state updates are merged or in more simple words React will update only the properties mentioned in `setState` method leaving the remaining state as is. For more info **[see the documentation](/docs/state-and-lifecycle.html#state-updates-are-merged)**.
We will now make a few changes to the Game's `handleClick` method which fires when you click on a square.
The `stepNumber` state we've added reflects the move displayed to the user now. After we make a new move, we need to update `stepNumber` by adding `stepNumber: history.length` as part of the `this.setState` argument. This ensures we don't get stuck showing the same move after a new one has been made.
We will also replace reading `this.state.history` with `this.state.history.slice(0, this.state.stepNumber + 1)`. This ensures that if we "go back in time" and then make a new move from that point, we throw away all the "future" history that would now be incorrect.
Finally, we will modify the Game component's `render` method from always rendering the last move to rendering the currently selected move according to `stepNumber`:
If we click on any step in the game's history, the tic-tac-toe board should immediately update to show what the board looked like after that step occurred.
If you have extra time or want to practice your new React skills, here are some ideas for improvements that you could make to the tic-tac-toe game which are listed in order of increasing difficulty:
Throughout this tutorial, we touched on React concepts including elements, components, props, and state. For a more detailed explanation of each of these topics, check out [the rest of the documentation](/docs/hello-world.html). To learn more about defining components, check out the [`React.Component` API reference](/docs/react-component.html).
