Learning React Native: Building Native Mobile Apps with JavaScript

by Bonnie Eisenman

Get a practical introduction to React Native, the JavaScript framework for writing and deploying fully featured mobile apps that render natively. The second edition of this hands-on guide shows you how to build applications that target iOS, Android, and other mobile platforms instead of browsers―apps that can access platform features such as the camera, user location, and local storage. Through code examples and step-by-step instructions, web developers and frontend engineers familiar with React will learn how to build and style interfaces, use mobile components, and debug and deploy apps. You’ll learn how to extend React Native using third-party libraries or your own Java and Objective-C libraries.

Genres: Technology, Programming, Nonfiction, Computer Science, Computers, Software

240 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2016

About the author

Bonnie Eisenman is a software engineer at Twitter and a member of the hackerspace NYC Resistor, with previous experience at Codecademy, Fog Creek Software, and Google. She is the author of Learning React Native, a book on building native mobile applications with Javascript. She has spoken at several conferences on topics ranging from ReactJS, to musical programming and Arduinos. In her spare time, she enjoys learning languages, tinkering with hardware projects, and laser-cutting chocolate. Find her on Twitter as @brindelle.

Reviews

[Zivile · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book is really excellent in giving examples how to create simple apps, from starting to deploying in apple or google stores.
The only downsides are that even if the book is relatively fresh but it was written in ES5, which is very outdated for React, and the examples could include some more difficult examples just for people to be aware which direction to go.

[Angela Omelo]

so good

[Alexis Hevia · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you have previous experience with React but no native development experience, this book will definitely help you get started. It has short, well-explained examples on how to get the most common tasks done.

[Ahmed · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic read. Very clear and easy to follow. Bonnie does a great job of hitting the high points.

[Radimir Bitsov · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book explains on a high level how React Native works, provides an information on the available components in regards to their native equivalents, and goes in details about the build and deployment process. It’s a good reading material providing practical examples in a form of several small apps. However, I was expecting a deeper explanation of the React Native bridge and the mechanism of rendering native components from the React Native ones. Also, I founded the book a bit outdated especially considering the availability of solutions like Expo which simplifies significantly the development and publishing processes.

[Phong Vu · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book covers the fundamental parts when working with React Native, but with the assumption that you already have a background on React and JavaScript. Besides, it is somewhat out-dated. Still, you would be able to grasp the key concepts and start working with React Native to build great mobile apps after finish this short book.

[Yosif · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good and practical introduction book. Very short and doesn't include many things in depth.

[Jaroslav Khorishchenko · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nice book but already old for 2017

[Sergey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Книга для тех, кто хочет быстро освоить React Native. Написана простым языком и читается на одном дыхании. Хотя автор и не углубляется в детали, книга даст целостное представление о React Native.

[Jules · Rating 3 out of 5]

Didn't manage to get enough momentum to see this through. Will need to try again next year.

[Alan · Rating 4 out of 5]

A must read to get started on React Native development. I missed more complex code examples/projects.

[Aileen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good book for starters with good examples and thorough code.

[Ross Huggett · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was a good introduction to React Native but I like like to learn by trying out the code samples which didn't work for me. The problem was that they hadn't been updated with subsequent versions of React Native, so I wasted my time trying to get them to work. It also used old syntax. The theory was sound though and I liked the suggestion of making changes to the worked example yourself to learn. Shame it didn't work for me.

[Delhi Irc]

Location: ND6 IRC
Accession No: DL030006