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How to add a Search Bar in React

Debora Galeano on November 07, 2020

This post will cover the following: Simple steps on how to add a search bar in React We'll use useState for managing the input text field Filter...

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Terrance Corley • Nov 8 '20

Awesome post! I’m curious, would it be better to manage the filtered list in state? Wondering if it’s “best practice” to pass a list as a prop down that isn’t being managed by state.

Debora Galeano • Nov 10 '20

Hi Terrance, thanks for your message! The contacts list is actually being managed by state and passed down as props. The difference is that it's conditionally doing so through the filteredContacts (so if there's no search, contacts list will be passed down as is, if not, it will passed down same list but filtered). Not sure if I'm answering your question.🤔

Terrance Corley • Nov 13 '20

Yeah! Makes perfect sense. The thing I noticed is you pass down filteredContacts, not contacts, so you never have the filtered list of contacts in state. That’s the part I was curious about if it’s “best practice” or not. I do see that filteredContacts is created from contacts, but filteredContacts just lives in a variable that is passed as a prop, it’s not actually a part of your state. I don’t know if that really matters though. Regardless, awesome post! Keep em’ coming.