I'll be honest and say that a lot of those concerns seem like things that Redux couldn't possibly have any solutions for. How can the core library tell you "what to name action creators" or "where to put connected components"? Those are style guide / app architecture concerns that are going to be specific to each team.
FWIW, there _are_ a lot of chunks of reusable Redux-based logic out there (which I have listed in my Redux addons catalog [0]), but I'd agree that there does tend to be enough variation in people's use of Redux that sharing larger chunks can be difficult. I've seen quite a few experiments with various forms of Redux "modules", but yeah, none of them have fully taken off. There _are_ several very interesting higher-level wrappers around Redux that look like they offer potential solutions to the reuse / structure question, like Kea, Rematch, and redux-bundler.
While I sort of understand the concern in your last paragraph, I'm again not sure what sort of "guidance Redux could offer" in this case. If you've got suggestions for improving the docs, please file an issue, or even better, a PR, and we can work to get something in.
> Those are style guide / app architecture concerns that are going to be specific to each team.
Exactly, but it's Redux's fault that it actively adds like 5 new styleguide/app architecture concerns to worry about in your project! That is a bad thing about its fundamental design.
For crying out loud, just put redux-thunk back in the core library. Nobody doesn't have async actions! One less thing to make a decision about.
> While I sort of understand the concern in your last paragraph, I'm again not sure what sort of "guidance Redux could offer" in this case.
I find that response pretty obtuse. I just told you what I told my developers in their code reviews, how about some language like that? Developers don't realize that connect() is just dependency injection for props, and those props should at least make sense from a dumb-component standpoint before Redux is involved.
Or how about including a render-prop version of connect in the library, so developers don't go making a bunch of useless props in the first place? The HOC version is what is leading them towards poor design decisions.
If your library is too easy for average devs to use poorly and my biggest headache during code reviews, to me that points to some issue with the library. This is why there is often "backlash" type sentiments around Redux being so popular.
FWIW, I've put together a small "starter kit" lib that's intended to simplify some of the process around setting up a Redux store [0] . We do include redux-thunk by default there, as well as Immer for simplifying immutable updates in reducers. It's still a personal-scoped package atm, but longer-term we'd like to make it an official Redux-branded addon.
I'm serious about the request for a docs PR. I'll agree that our docs are currently a bit weak on "real-world" app architecture instructions. If you feel there's specific advice that should be in there, _please_ file a PR! I'm already swamped with other things on my task list, and simply don't have time to add major new sections to the docs myself right now. I keep begging the community for help improving the docs so we can make things better for everyone, and I have a bunch of open issues tagged "docs" I've been trying to get help with, yet we get almost zero actual meaningful contributions.
I'm not sure how HOCs vs render props "leads people to make poor design decisions".
The Redux team's main focus in the near future is figuring out how to update React-Redux to better work with the upcoming async React rendering capabilities [1]. We've got a couple open PRs atm, one that's trying to fix the "strict mode" warnings [2], and one I did a few weeks ago that experiments with using the new context API for better compatibility [3]. The immediate goal is to keep the public API the same to provide basic compatibility with async React behavior, but longer-term, we may have to rethink the API to fully take advantage of what React can do. We aren't planning to add a render props API right now, but that could be on the table for a v6 API change in the future.
Again, right now there's two primary maintainers: myself, and Tim Dorr. Both of us are doing this in our spare time, and there's only so much we can do. If you're using Redux, and you feel there's deficiencies in the docs or how it's being used, don't just complain - _please_ offer some help so the community can benefit!
> I'm not sure how HOCs vs render props "leads people to make poor design decisions".
This surprises me.
A render prop doesn't force any particular component interface. You just get a function and do whatever you want with the arguments (including just passing them along as props to another component, if you want).
HOCs force all the stuff you want to pull out of state to be passed as props, even if those props are not the ideal interface for the component you're wrapping, and they output a new component that you have to use instead of the original. Combined with derived state like reselect, this can lead to very weird component props that you'd never even consider if you were just designing a dumb-component without consideration for Redux.
Honestly, I've never used render props yet myself, for a variety of reasons, so I just don't have the experience to understand your concerns there.
As I said: if you have specific concerns that you think can be resolved by changes in the docs or the Redux/React-Redux libraries, please file an issue so we can discuss them in more detail.
FWIW, there _are_ a lot of chunks of reusable Redux-based logic out there (which I have listed in my Redux addons catalog [0]), but I'd agree that there does tend to be enough variation in people's use of Redux that sharing larger chunks can be difficult. I've seen quite a few experiments with various forms of Redux "modules", but yeah, none of them have fully taken off. There _are_ several very interesting higher-level wrappers around Redux that look like they offer potential solutions to the reuse / structure question, like Kea, Rematch, and redux-bundler.
While I sort of understand the concern in your last paragraph, I'm again not sure what sort of "guidance Redux could offer" in this case. If you've got suggestions for improving the docs, please file an issue, or even better, a PR, and we can work to get something in.