How to trigger an event when a component is shown when using react-native-navigation?

Question

I am using react-native with react-native-navigation. I would like to reload data when a component is shown. The component is shown when a user clicks on a tab navigation button

Answer 1

include this as 'callIfBackToThisRoute'...

export default ( props, call ) => {
    if( !props.navigation ) throw 'I need props.navigation'
    const thisRoute = props.navigation.state.routeName;
    props.navigation.addListener(
        'willFocus',
        payload => {
            if( payload.state.routeName == thisRoute) call(props)
        }
    );
}

and use it inside your component...

componentDidMount() {
    const { doIt } = this.props;
    doIt()
    callIfBackToThisRoute(
        this.props,
        (props) => doIt()
    )
}

Answer 2

This is what I ended up using:

export default class RootNavigator extends React.Component {
  state = {currentScreen: null}

  _onNavigationStateChange(prevState, newState, action) {
    // const currentScreen = getCurrentRouteName(currentState)
    // const prevScreen = getCurrentRouteName(prevState)
    // console.debug('onNavigationStateChange currentScreen=', currentScreen,
    //   'prevScreen=', prevScreen, 'action.routeName=', action.routeName)
    console.debug('onNavigationStateChange action.routeName=', action.routeName)
    this.setState({currentScreen: action.routeName})
  }

  render() {
    return <RootStackNavigator onNavigationStateChange={this._onNavigationStateChange.bind(this)}
      screenProps={{currentScreen: this.state.currentScreen}}/>;
  }

coupled with componentDidUpdate() on the screen (which may or may not perform something depending on the screenProps's currentScreen).

Note: I don't know what/where getCurrentRouteName() is and it gave error for me so I don't use it and use action.routeName directly.

See https://github.com/react-community/react-navigation/issues/2371 and https://github.com/react-community/react-navigation/issues/51#issuecomment-323536642 for more information and discussion.

Answer 3

For RNN v3, after trying out for quite a couple times, I finally figured out the correct way:

  componentDidMount() {
    this.navigationEventListener = Navigation.events().bindComponent(this);
  }

  componentWillUnmount() {
    if (this.navigationEventListener) {
      this.navigationEventListener.remove();
    }
  }

  componentDidAppear() {   // Lazy loading data for RNN
    if (this.state.routes.length === 0) {
      this.getData();
    }
  }

The key is that, the binding of event listener is mandatory, otherwise the componentDidAppear() and componentDidDisappear() won't be triggered.

Answer 4

The currently accepted answer suggests a react-navigation solution, not react-native-navigation (RNN), so I'll go ahead and give my two cents.

As Stephen Liu points out in his answer, RNN provides screen lifecycle methods that fire when a component appears (componentDidAppear) and disappears (componentDidDisappear).

Stephen's answer works for a class component, however in the age of hooks I prefer function components. So this is how to use RNN's screen lifecycle methods in a function component:

import React, { useEffect } from 'react'
import { Navigation } from 'react-native-navigation'

const MyComponent = ({ componentId }) => {

  useEffect(() => {
    const navListener = Navigation.events().bindComponent(this, componentId)

    // remove the listener during cleanup
    return () => {
      navListener.remove()
    }
  }, [componentId])

  this.componentDidAppear = () => {
    // do stuff when component appears
  }

  this. componentDidDisappear = () => {
    // do stuff when component disappears
  }

}

Important: MyComponent needs a componentId prop, which is injected automatically if it's a registered RNN screen or modal (Navigation.registerComponent). You can also manually pass it down from a screen component to the child where you need it.

Answer 5

I like the solution proposed by Bruno Reis. I tweaked mine to make it a bit simpler.

class Whatever extends Component {
    componentDidMount(){
        this.load()
        this.props.navigation.addListener('willFocus', this.load)
    }
    load = () => {
        ...
    }

}

Answer 6

Override componentWillMount lifecycle method: https://facebook.github.io/react/docs/component-specs.html#mounting-componentwillmount Or just put the functionality inside render method