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Pontakorn Paesaeng
Pontakorn Paesaeng

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I built a note taking app to practice React

Original Thai version: https://pontakorn.dev/blog/note-taking-app-with-react

I am during university vacation right now so I am kinda free. I have no idea what to do next and just stumble upon Zustand from a discussion about state management tools. So, I decided that I would try to it with React.

Structure of Starnote

React: Yeah, I use React to practice React. Actually, I wanted to try CSS-in-JS solution except there are too few components to even benefit from it.

CSS Module: Since there is no benefit using CSS-in-JS library. I tried using CSS Module instead. At least, I don't have to worry about cascading and naming much.

Vite: I use Vite for all projects including React, Vue, or even Svelte. It's easy to setup things and it's fast to reload.

Zustand: I found it from this thread. I am interested because it only uses React Hook and not wrapping components.

I use TypeScript for this project because it is easier to find bug and TypeScript has better autocomplete.

Starnote Development

It is a side project without plan to publish. The MVP version includes CRUD operations, Markdown support, syntax highlighting and saving to localStorage.

Starnote Project Structure

store/note.ts: This is where I put Zustand store and code working with localStorage. It might be large but I think it's too small to separate into different files.

TheSidebar and TheEditor: I only use one component so I prefix them with "The". They both connect with Zustand directly.

There is nothing interesting about development of Zustand enough to put on this blog. I want to write my own CSS so I didn't use WindiCSS or Tailwind. I use ReactMarkdown and ReactSyntaxHighlighter but not markdown editor. It's just a normal textarea.

Starnote Preview Mode

Possible improvement

If anyone tried to use Starnote with mobile, they wil find that it is not responsive yet. If there is anything to improve, I would try this one first. So, I can fully put live demo online.

Also, I would like to implement online saving. Users would be able to edit their notes from anywhere. I don't focus on this part yet. If I get a chance to do, I might try either Firebase or Supabase to not having to write backend.

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