React Skills for LlamaFarm Designer

Best practices and patterns for React 18 development in the Designer subsystem.

Tech Stack

• React 18.2 with StrictMode
• TypeScript 5.2+ for type safety
• TanStack Query v5 for server state management
• React Router v7 for client-side routing
• TailwindCSS with tailwind-merge and clsx for styling
• Radix UI primitives for accessible components
• Vite for build tooling
• Vitest + React Testing Library for testing

Directory Structure

designer/src/
  api/          # API service functions
  components/   # React components (feature-organized)
  contexts/     # React context providers
  hooks/        # Custom hooks
  lib/          # Utility functions (cn, etc.)
  types/        # TypeScript type definitions
  utils/        # Helper functions
  test/         # Test utilities and mocks

Core Patterns

Component Composition

• Use composition over inheritance
• Prefer small, focused components
• Use forwardRef for components that wrap DOM elements
• Apply displayName to forwardRef components for DevTools

State Management

• Local UI state: useState, useReducer
• Server state: TanStack Query (useQuery, useMutation)
• Shared UI state: React Context with custom hooks
• Form state: Controlled components with validation

Hooks

• Follow Rules of Hooks (top-level, consistent order)
• Create custom hooks for reusable logic
• Use query key factories for TanStack Query
• Memoize expensive computations with useMemo
• Stabilize callbacks with useCallback

Styling

• Use cn() from lib/utils to merge Tailwind classes
• Use cva (class-variance-authority) for component variants
• Follow dark mode conventions with dark: prefix

Related Guides

• components.md - Component patterns
• hooks.md - Hook patterns and rules
• state.md - State management patterns
• performance.md - Performance optimization
• security.md - Security best practices

Quick Reference

// Utility for merging Tailwind classes
import { cn } from '@/lib/utils'
cn('base-class', condition && 'conditional-class', className)

// Query key factory pattern
export const projectKeys = {
  all: ['projects'] as const,
  lists: () => [...projectKeys.all, 'list'] as const,
  list: (ns: string) => [...projectKeys.lists(), ns] as const,
}

// Context with validation hook
const MyContext = createContext<MyContextType | undefined>(undefined)
export function useMyContext() {
  const ctx = useContext(MyContext)
  if (!ctx) throw new Error('useMyContext must be within MyProvider')
  return ctx
}

Testing

import { renderWithProviders } from '@/test/utils'
import { screen } from '@testing-library/react'

test('renders component', () => {
  renderWithProviders(<MyComponent />)
  expect(screen.getByText('Hello')).toBeInTheDocument()
})