For the last week now I've been completely at a loss for how to set up server side rendering with React. This is a new project but it's an express server and I'm attempting to render just a super simple hello world react app which uses react-router-component..
I think the best way for me to get some help is to share the code I have right now and I'm hoping somebody can please tell me what I'm doing wrong! I've followed tutorial after tutorial and tried all sorts of different things but I keep getting error after error!
This is my app.js for the express server, the relevant code is the * route if you scroll down a bit:
require('node-jsx').install({extension: '.jsx'});
var React = require('react');
var App = require('./src/App.jsx');
var request = require('superagent');
var express = require('express');
var path = require('path');
var favicon = require('serve-favicon');
var logger = require('morgan');
var cookieParser = require('cookie-parser');
var bodyParser = require('body-parser');
var url = require('url');
//Database and Passport requires
var mongoose = require('mongoose');
var passport = require('passport');
var LocalStrategy = require('passport-local');
// var api = require('./routes/api');
var app = express();
app.set('views', path.join(__dirname, 'views'));
app.set('view engine', 'jade');
// uncomment after placing your favicon in /public
//app.use(favicon(__dirname + '/public/favicon.ico'));
app.use(logger('dev'));
app.use(bodyParser.json());
app.use(bodyParser.urlencoded({ extended: false }));
app.use(cookieParser());
app.use(require('express-session')({
secret: 'secret',
resave: false,
saveUninitialized: false
}));
app.use(passport.initialize());
app.use(passport.session());
app.use(express.static(path.join(__dirname, 'public')));
//passport config
var Account = require('./models/account');
passport.use(new LocalStrategy(Account.authenticate()));
passport.serializeUser(Account.serializeUser());
passport.deserializeUser(Account.deserializeUser());
//mongoose
mongoose.connect('mongodb://localhost/database');
//THIS is the relevant section that renders React and sends to client
app.get('*', function(req, res, next){
var path = url.parse(req.url).pathname;
React.renderToString(
React.createFactory(App({path : path})),
function(err, markup) {
res.send('<!DOCTYPE html>' + markup);
}
);
});
// catch 404 and forward to error handler
app.use(function(req, res, next) {
var err = new Error('Not Found');
err.status = 404;
next(err);
});
// error handlers
// development error handler
// will print stacktrace
if (app.get('env') === 'development') {
app.use(function(err, req, res, next) {
res.status(err.status || 500);
res.render('error', {
message: err.message,
error: err
});
});
}
// production error handler
// no stacktraces leaked to user
app.use(function(err, req, res, next) {
res.status(err.status || 500);
res.render('error', {
message: err.message,
error: {}
});
});
module.exports = app;
the App.jsx file being required in the app.js file:
/**
* @jsx React.DOM
*/
var React = require('react');
var Router = require('react-router-component');
var Locations = Router.Locations;
var Location = Router.Location;
var Index = require('./components/Index.jsx');
var App = React.createClass({
render: function() {
return (
<html>
<head lang="en">
<meta charSet="UTF-8"/>
<title>React App</title>
</head>
<body>
<div id="main">
<Locations path={this.props.path}>
<Location path="/" handler={Index} />
</Locations>
</div>
<script type="text/javascript" src="./javascripts/bundle.js"></script>
</body>
</html>
)
}
});
module.exports = App;
and the Index.jsx file required in the App.jsx:
var React = require('react');
var Index = React.createClass({
render: function() {
return (
<div className="test">
<span>Whats going on</span>
</div>
)
}
});
module.exports = Index;
I'm only showing you my most recent attempt at getting this to work here but rest assured I've tried all different methods to render a react component, such as renderComponentToString, I've also tried React.renderToString(React.createElement(App)) etc etc..
But now I keep getting this error "Cannot read property '__reactAutoBindMap' of undefined"
Please Help!!! :) Thanks
React.createFactory(App({path : path}))should be:React.createElement(App({path : path}))– ClapperReact.createElement.React.createElement(App, {path : path})– Divisionism