React Native is developed in such a way that we can create a bridge between the Native Language and the JavaScript code. A bridge is nothing but a way to setup communication between native platform and React Native.
But why do we need it?
Let’s assume you want to reuse some existing Java code or library without having to reimplement it in JavaScript. Yes, you guessed it right, you can use it in your React Native application with the help of Native Bridge. At some point of time, to make a production-level application you will most probably need to use Native Bridge.
“As long as we are building our application purely within the framework, we can drive our app with properties and callbacks. But, when we mix React Native and native components, we need some specific, cross-language mechanisms that would allow us to pass information between them.”
You have to learn two modules
- Native Modules
- Native UI Components
Native Modules
A Native Module is just a set of javascript functions that are implemented natively for individual platform. Native Modules are used when React Native doesn’t have that required module yet, or when the native performance is significantly better.
To understand this concept better we will implement a toast mechanism in which the toast would be coming from the native android and we will call it from a button made in React Native. In case you are wondering “what a toast is?”, think of it as an alert message for your app.
Native UI Components
There are tons of native UI widgets out there ready to be used in the latest apps. Fortunately, we can wrap up these existing components for seamless integration with our React Native application. Without further ado, let’s head over to the practical part.
You can see there are two types of bridge.
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