Your production-ready app will include a cart, a login page, and other e-commerce features. 

What do you need to know? 

Before you dive into the book, you will want to be familiar with the basics of HTML and CSS. It will also help to have a foundational knowledge of JavaScript, although we will cover some JavaScript concepts throughout the book. You will use these three languages as you build your React application. No need to know anything about React as we will take you through it step by step. 

What will you learn? 

Components 

You will build your application with functional components and JSX. Using components will allow you to reuse code across your application. Components also help organize your code in a logical way that makes it easier to understand and allows for the separation of concerns. 

Hooks 

You will learn how and when to use the most common React hooks: useEffect,  useState,  useReducer,  useRef, useContext,  useMemo,  and useCallback. You will have opportunities to compare similar hooks and choose the one to fit your situation best. Additionally, we will walk you through creating a custom hook so that you can further take advantage of all hooks have to offer. 

Sharing State 

You will use props and context to share the state between components and to keep up with the state between multiple pages. We will compare the trade-offs between the methods, so you can select which is best for each use case in your application. 

API Integration 

You will practice connecting your app to a server using both API requests and web sockets so that you can send and receive information. You will also learn how to display loading and error states to keep your users in the loop during API interactions. 

Testing 

You will learn how to thoroughly test your React components and flows using React Testing Library. You will also gain experience writing end-to-end tests with Cypress, a powerful testing framework for modern web applications. Additionally, we will cover setting up a mock server to test your application in a controlled environment. By comparing different testing methods, you will learn to choose the most effective approach for your needs. 

Performance Tuning 

Once you’ve completed the two applications and honed your React skills, you will dive into performance optimization. You will discover how to fine-tune your components to ensure your applications respond quickly to user interactions. You will analyze the bundle size of your application and use lazy loading to reduce the time to first contentful paint. You will analyze a large page that responds slowly to user input and use tools like memo, useMemo, useCallback, and useTransition to improve responsiveness. 

Helpful Tools 

There are several community libraries that you will use throughout this book. One of those will be React Router, which you will use to navigate your application. You will use PropTypes to specify the props coming into your components, so you will know if your components receive incorrect props. You will also use ESLint to check your application for coding errors and to enforce coding style. 

Where can you buy the book? 

You can order print and DRM-free electronic copies from InformIT. It is also available from Amazon and other booksellers. 

If you want the whole Big Nerd Ranch experience, enroll in one of our bootcamps or bring us on-site with our corporate training. 

The post Now Available React Programming: The Big Nerd Ranch Guide appeared first on Big Nerd Ranch.

We’ve just rolled out our newest training course for web: React Essentials. This course serves as a complete rewrite of what was formerly Full-Stack and React Essentials, and we are really happy with the shift in focus for the course. 

It is our passion to see developers leave our classes with all the skills they need for successful work in a new environment. This course pivots our class to have its full attention focus on React.

So, What’s New?

React Essentials is an extensive overview that covers how to develop web applications using React. Over the course of 3.5 days, students will build a coffee shop with a home page, details page, cart, checkout, and order fulfillment page for associates. They will also integrate the front-end with a supplied API. Here is what students can expect to learn in the completely revamped course.

Hooks

React Hooks provide so much power in easy to to use packages. We have provided training into all of the basic hooks for state, effects, and context, as well as many of the additional hooks.

We’ll build Cart with useReducer to help developers get the full flavor of reducers without having to dive into Redux. We also optimize our components with useCallback and useMemo, and we access elements with useRef.

React Router

These days most web applications have multiple pages. Our students will learn to use React Router to handle directing the user to each of those pages. We also use React Routers hooks to access params from the URL and change the page.

Testing

For the first time ever, the course covers component testing with the React Testing Library and end-to-end testing with Cypress. Students will be able to build real applications with tests to feel confident in not breaking the applications.

We also discuss the tradeoffs between various testing strategies to help students make educated decisions on how to test their applications.

What’s Changed?

While the course still covers web development, the focus is now on React and not on the basics of HTML and CSS or CSS frameworks like Bootstrap. As a result, students will need some familiarity with HTML and CSS coming in. The course does still cover more advanced CSS topics like flexbox, grid, and animations.

What’s next?

We will be offering open enrollment courses for React Essentials several times this year. Our first class of the year is online March 22 – 26 and you can register here.

Stay tuned for a closer look at the projects we will be building in this course.

The post Our New React Essentials Course appeared first on Big Nerd Ranch.

We have offered training on web development since the very beginning, but we felt like we were not quite hitting the right notes with our most recent course offering: Full-Stack & React Essentials. So, we have invested the past few months in developing an all-in course on React Essentials. The course, like many of our other courses, is designed to show experienced programmers what’s possible with React development and give them the confidence to explore more. So why the change?

Reason #1 – Client Feedback

React is no secret. It is a technology that has been around and is in high demand. You might say but I thought Big Nerd Ranch only taught the latest, up-and-coming, cutting edge technologies? We love teaching and working with the latest and greatest in technology. It’s how we got where we are today. At the same time, we want to teach and use technologies that can support professional, elegant products and that individuals, businesses, and enterprises can use to build their visions into a reality. 

This change also reflects a sentiment we have been hearing from our students and clients for the better part of a year. Time after time, we heard that folks were really enjoying the course, but they were hoping to learn more about React programming. The sentiment was the same for our corporate clients as well. One of our core values here is curiosity, so it is important for us to listen to our clients and to make adjustments accordingly.

Reason #2 – Mobile Focus

One of the other reasons we have focused on React is that it continues our focus on teaching developers how to build mobile applications. Because React is a mobile responsive framework, it is a natural fit along with our native mobile training offerings for iOS and Android.

Reason #3 – Experience and Expertise

We have been working on React projects for over five years, so it is a technology we know well. When we talk with clients about consulting projects where we are going to be building a new web product, we often recommend React because of its versatility, performance, and scalability. We want our training to be authentically useful, so we want to train on technologies that we would not just use but would happily recommend for a professional grade web application.

Reason #4 – Reskilling & Upskilling

While we are proud of our Full-Stack & React Essentials course, we feel like it isn’t quite hitting the mark. We’ve always provided a platform for existing developers to learn a transformative set of skills that could set them up for their next big project, and we found that the course in its existing form wasn’t meeting that mark.

Our goal with our Essentials courses has always been to prepare developers to start working on a project, and that goal hasn’t changed with our fully refreshed course on React development. We’ve packed the course full of foundational knowledge that existing developers need to begin work on a React project, and we are looking forward to helping individuals, teams, and companies build their capabilities in React.

Are you ready to get started?

Our first revamped React class is scheduled for March 22nd and spots are filling up fast. Now’s your chance to take a deep-dive into React and learn more about this modern framework for web development.

Check out the course page to learn a bit more about what you can expect from the class and register.

The post Why the Move to React appeared first on Big Nerd Ranch.