Integrating React Bootstrap and Reagent

5/11/2015
3 min read

Integrating React Bootstrap and Reagent

This weekend, I am experimenting to use React Bootstrap with ClojureScript. For whom that doesn’t know it yet, React Bootstrap is a Bootstrap 3 component built with ReactJS. I’m using Reagent library for interacting with React from ClojureScript, instead of Om.

Integrating React Bootstrap and Reagent was confusing me at the first. It was non-trivial effort. I searched Google and got no relevant solutions for hours. So, this working solution is based on my trial and error experimentation.

Let’s start.

In project.clj file, I use Reagent with :exclusions, because I have to use React version from NPM not the version that comes from Reagent. Don’t forget to create react.cljs which contains only (ns cljsjs.react).

project.clj

(defproject sample "0.1.0-SNAPSHOT"
  :description "Write your definition here."
  :url "http://sample.org"
  :license {:name "Eclipse Public License"
            :url "http://www.eclipse.org/legal/epl-v10.html"}
  :dependencies [[org.clojure/clojure "1.7.0-beta2"]
                 [org.clojure/clojurescript "0.0-3269"]
                 [reagent "0.5.0" :exclusions  [cljsjs/react]]]
  :node-dependencies [[react-bootstrap "0.21.2"]]
  :plugins [[lein-cljsbuild "1.0.5"]
            [lein-npm "0.5.0"]]
  :source-paths  ["src-clj"]
  :resource-path "resources"
  :npm-root "resources"
  :cljsbuild {:builds [{:source-paths ["src-cljs"]
                        :compiler {:output-to "resources/main.js"
                        :optimizations :advanced
                        :pretty-print true}}]})

react.cljs

(ns cljsjs.react)

Now, look at the index.html file. I use React and React Bootstrap which come from NPM. I manage the NPM dependencies by using lein-npm. It is a good Leiningen plugin for integrating NPM and Leiningen seamlessly.

index.html

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
  <head>
    <meta charset="utf-8">
    <meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=edge">
    <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1, maximum-scale=1, user-scalable=no">

    <title>Sample</title>

    <link rel="stylesheet" href="css/bootstrap.min.css">
  </head>

  <body>
    <div id="apps" class="container-fluid"></div>

    <script type="text/javascript" src="react.min.js"></script>
    <script type="text/javascript" src="react-bootstrap.min.js"></script>
    <script type="text/javascript" src="main.js"></script>
  </body>
</html>

Finally in core.cljs, I can do JS interop to call React component from React Bootstrap module.

core.cljs

(ns sample.core
  (:require [cljsjs.react]
            [reagent.core :as reagent :refer [atom]]))

(defn text-editor
  "Text editor for static blog."
  []
  (let [grid (aget js/ReactBootstrap "Grid")
        row (aget js/ReactBootstrap "Row")
        col (aget js/ReactBootstrap "Col")]
    (reagent/create-element grid #js{}
      (reagent/create-element row #js{}
        (reagent/create-element col #js{:xs 6 :md 6}

          ;; create div for text editor
          (reagent/create-element "div" #js{:contentEditable true} "Left column"))
          (reagent/create-element col #js{:xs 6 :md 6} "Right column")))))

(reagent/render [text-editor] (.getElementById js/document "apps"))

This is my working project structure for doing all those thing.

doc
resources
-- node_modules
---- react-bootstrap
---- react
-- index.html
-- main.js
src-clj
src-cljs
-- cljsjs
---- react.cljs
-- sample
---- core.cljs
target
test
project.clj

Programming

ASEP BAGJA

product engineer & electronic musician

Integrating React Bootstrap and Reagent