• Motivation
• Modelling user interfaces with state machines
• Installation
• Code examples
• API design goals
• API
  • <Machine fsm, eventHandler, preprocessor, commandHandlers, effectHandlers, options, renderWith />
    • Description
    • Example
      • Encoding the machine graph
      • A stateless component to render the user interface
      • Implementing the user interface with <Machine />
      • The final application set-up
    • A typical machine run
    • Types
    • Contracts
    • Semantics
  • testMachineComponent(testAPI, testScenario, machineDefinition)
• Tips and gotchas
• Prior art and useful references

Motivation

User interfaces are reactive systems which can be modelized accurately by state machines. There is a number of state machine libraries in the field with varying design objectives. We have proposed an extended state machine library with a minimal API, architected around a single causal, effect-less function. This particular design requires integration with the interfaced systems, in order to produce the necessary effects (user events, system events, user actions). We present here an integration of our proposed machine library with React.

This document is structured as follows :

• we quickly present the rationale behind modelling user interfaces with state machines and the resulting architecture
• we continue with our API design goals
• we finally explain and document the actual API together with a simple example of use, taken from other similar libraries

Modelling user interfaces with state machines

We are going all along to refer to a image search application example to illustrate our argumentation. Cf. Example section for more details.

In a traditional architecture, a simple scenario would be expressed as follows :

What we can derive from that is that the application is interfacing with other systems : the user interface and what we call external systems (local storage, databases, etc.). The application responsibility is to translate user actions on the user interface into commands on the external systems, execute those commands and deal with their result.

In our proposed architecture, the same scenario would become :

In that architecture, the application is refactored into a mediator, a preprocessor, a state machine, a command handler, and an effect handler. The application is thus split into smaller parts which address specific concerns :

• the preprocessor translates user interface events into inputs for the state machine
• the state machine computes the commands to execute as a result of its present and past inputs, or, what is equivalent, its present input and current state
• the command handler interprets and executes incoming commands, delegating the execution of effects to the effect handler when necessary
• the mediator orchestrates the user interface, the preprocessor, the state machine and the command handler

While the architecture may appear more complex (isolating concerns means more parts), we have reduced the complexity born from the interconnection between the parts.

Concretely, we increased the testability of our implementation :

• the mediator algorithm is the same independently of the pieces it coordinates. This means it can be written and tested once, then reused at will. This is our <Machine /> component. This is glue code that you do not have to write and test anymore
• effect handlers are pretty generic pieces of code. An example could be code to fetch a resource. That code is written and tested once (and comes generally tested out of the box), and then reused for any resource. Additionally, only the effect handlers can perform effects on the external systems, which helps testing, tracing and debugging[^3]
• effect handlers, being isolated in their own module, are easy to mock, without resorting to a complex machinery specific to a testing library
• the state machine is a function which performs no effects, and whose output exclusively depends on current state, and present input[^2]. We will use the term causal functions for such functions, in reference to causal systems, which exhibit the same property[^1]. The causality property means state machines are a breeze to reason about and test (well, not as much as pure functions, but infinitely better than effectful functions)
• only the preprocessor and mediator can perform effects on the user interface, which helps testing, tracing and debugging

We also have achieved greater modularity: our parts are coupled only through their interface. For instance, we use in our example below Rxjs for preprocessing events, and state-transducer as state machine library. We could easily switch to most and xstate if the need be, or to a barebone event emitter (like emitonoff) by simply building interface adapters.

There are more benefits but this is not the place to go about them. Cf:

• User interfaces as reactive systems
• Pure UI
• Pure UI control

[^3]: Command handlers can only perform effects internally (for instance async. communication with the mediator)
[^2]: In relation with state machines, it is the same to say that an output depends exclusively on past and present inputs and that an output exclusively depends on current state, and present input.
[^1]: Another term used elsewhere is deterministic functions, but we found that term could be confusing.

Installation

react is a peer dependency.

npm install react-state-driven

Code examples

For the impatient ones, you can directly review the available demos:

| Code playground | Machine | Screenshot |
|:----|:----:|:----:| |flickr image search| | | |TMDb movie search| | |

API design goals

We want to have an integration which is generic enough to accommodate a large set of use cases, and specific enough to be able to take advantage as much as possible of the React ecosystem and API. Unit-testing should ideally be based on the specifications of the behaviour of the component rather than its implementation details, and leverage the automatic test generator of the underlying state-tranducer library. In particular :

• it should be seamless to use both controlled and uncontrolled components
• it should be possible to use without risk of interference standard React features like Context
• it should use the absolute minimum React features internally, in order to favor for instance a painless port to React copycats (Preact, etc.)
• non-React functionalities should be coupled only through interfaces, allowing to use any suitable implementation
• the specifics of the implementation should not impact testing (hooks, suspense, context, etc.)

As a result of these design goals :

• we do not use React hooks, context, portal, fragments, jsx, and use the minimum React lifecycle hooks
• the component user can of course use the whole extent of the API at disposal, those restrictions only concern our implementation of the <Machine /> component.
• we defined interfaces for extended state updates (reducer interface), event processing (observer and observable interfaces).
• any state machine implementation (including one that uses no dedicated library) can be substituted to our library provided that it respects the machine interface and contracts:
  • the machine is implemented by a function
  • it takes an unique input parameter of the shape {[event name]: event data}
  • it returns an array of commands
  • it produces no effects
• we use dependency injection to pass the modules responsible for effects to the <Machine /> component

API

<Machine fsm, eventHandler, preprocessor, commandHandlers, effectHandlers, options, renderWith />

Description

We expose a <Machine /> React component which will hold the state machine and implement its behaviour using React's API. The Machine component behaviour is specified by its props. Those props reflect : the underlying machine, pre-processing of interfaced system's raw events, a set of functions executing machine commands and effects on the interfaced systems. The DOM rendering command handler is imposed by the <Machine /> component but can be customized via effectHandlers[COMMAND_RENDER] (see example).

Our Machine component expects some props but does not expect children components.

Example

To showcase usage of our react component with our machine library, we will implement an image search application. That application basically takes an input from the user, looks up images related to that search input, and displays it. The user can then click on a particular image to see it in more details.

For illustration, the user interface starts like this :

Click here for a live demo.

The user interface behaviour can be modelized by the following machine:

Let's see how to integrate that into a React codebase using our Machine component.

Encoding the machine graph

The machine is translated into the data structure expected by the supporting state-transducer library:

import { NO_OUTPUT } from "state-transducer";
import { COMMAND_SEARCH, NO_ACTIONS, NO_STATE_UPDATE } from "./properties";
import { applyJSONpatch, renderAction, renderGalleryApp } from "./helpers";

export const imageGalleryFsmDef = {
  events: [
    "START",
    "SEARCH",
    "SEARCH_SUCCESS",
    "SEARCH_FAILURE",
    "CANCEL_SEARCH",
    "SELECT_PHOTO",
    "EXIT_PHOTO"
  ],
  states: { init: "", start: "", loading: "", gallery: "", error: "", photo: "" },
  initialControlState: "init",
  initialExtendedState: {
    query: "",
    items: [],
    photo: undefined,
    gallery: ""
  },
  transitions: [
    { from: "init", event: "START", to: "start", action: NO_ACTIONS },
    { from: "start", event: "SEARCH", to: "loading", action: NO_ACTIONS },
    {
      from: "loading",
      event: "SEARCH_SUCCESS",
      to: "gallery",
      action: (extendedState, eventData, fsmSettings) => {
        const items = eventData;

        return {
          updates: [{ op: "add", path: "/items", value: items }],
          outputs: NO_OUTPUT
        };
      }
    },
    {
      from: "loading",
      event: "SEARCH_FAILURE",
      to: "error",
      action: NO_ACTIONS
    },
    {
      from: "loading",
      event: "CANCEL_SEARCH",
      to: "gallery",
      action: NO_ACTIONS
    },
    { from: "error", event: "SEARCH", to: "loading", action: NO_ACTIONS },
    { from: "gallery", event: "SEARCH", to: "loading", action: NO_ACTIONS },
    {
      from: "gallery",
      event: "SELECT_PHOTO",
      to: "photo",
      action: (extendedState, eventData, fsmSettings) => {
        const item = eventData;

        return {
          updates: [{ op: "add", path: "/photo", value: item }],
          outputs: NO_OUTPUT
        };
      }
    },
    { from: "photo", event: "EXIT_PHOTO", to: "gallery", action: NO_ACTIONS }
  ],
  entryActions: {
    loading: (extendedState, eventData, fsmSettings) => {
      const { items, photo } = extendedState;
      const query = eventData;
      const searchCommand = {
        command: COMMAND_SEARCH,
        params: query
      };
      const renderGalleryAction = renderAction({ query, items, photo, gallery: "loading" });

      return {
        outputs: [searchCommand].concat(renderGalleryAction.outputs),
        updates: NO_STATE_UPDATE
      };
    },
    photo: renderGalleryApp("photo"),
    gallery: renderGalleryApp("gallery"),
    error: renderGalleryApp("error"),
    start: renderGalleryApp("start")
  },
  updateState: applyJSONpatch,
}

Note:

• how the black bullet (entry point) from our machine graph corresponds to a init control state, which moves to the start control state with the initial event START.
• events and states respectively are a list of events and control states accepted and represented in the machine
• initialControlState and initialExtendedState encode the initial state for the machine
• the transitions property of the machine encodes the edges of the graph that modelizes the behaviour of the interface
• every control state entry will lead to displaying some screens. In order not to repeat that logic, we extract it into the entryActions property and we will use later the corresponding state-transducer plugin which makes use of this data
• updateState specifies how to update the extended state of the machine from a description of the updates to perform. We use JSON patch in our example. A redux-like reducer, proxy-based immer.js or any user-provided function could also be used, as long as it respects the defined interface.

A stateless component to render the user interface

The machine controls the user interface via the issuing of render commands, which include props for a user-provided React component. Here, those props are fed into GalleryApp, which renders the interface:

export function GalleryApp(props){
 // NOTE: `query` is not used! :-) Because we use a uncontrolled component, we need not use query
 const { query, photo, items, next, gallery: galleryState } = props;

 return div(".ui-app", { "data-state": galleryState }, [
   h(
     Form,
     {
       galleryState,
       onSubmit: (ev, formRef) => next(["onSubmit", ev, formRef]),
       onClick: ev => next(["onCancelClick"])
     },
     []
   ),
   h(
     Gallery,
     { galleryState, items, onClick: item => next(["onGalleryClick", item]) },
     []
   ),
   h(Photo, { galleryState, photo, onClick: ev => next(["onPhotoClick"]) }, [])
 ]);
}

Note:

• GalleryApp is a stateless functional component which only concerns itself with rendering the interface. The interface state concerns (representation, storage, retrieval, update, etc.) are handled by the state machine.

Implementing the user interface with <Machine />

We have our state machine defined, we have a component to render the user interface. We now have to implement the full user interface, e.g. processing events, and execute the appropriate commands in response. As we will use the <Machine /> component, we have to specify the corresponding props for it. Those props include, as the architecture indicates, an interface by which the user interface sends events to a preprocessor which transforms them into inputs for the state machine, which produces commands which are processed by command handlers, which delegate the actual effect execution to effect handlers:

import { COMMAND_RENDER, COMMAND_SEARCH, NO_INTENT } from "./properties"
import { filter, map } from "rxjs/operators"
import { runSearchQuery, destructureEvent } from "./helpers"
import { INIT_EVENT } from "state-transducer"
import { Subject } from "rxjs/index"
import { GalleryApp } from "./imageGalleryComponent"
import Flipping from "flipping"
import React from "react";

const flipping = new Flipping();

export const imageGalleryReactMachineDef = {
  options: { initialEvent: [ "START"] },
  renderWith: GalleryApp,
  eventHandler: new Subject(),
  preprocessor: rawEventSource =>
    rawEventSource.pipe(
      map(ev => {
        const { rawEventName, rawEventData: e, ref } = destructureEvent(ev);

        if (rawEventName === INIT_EVENT) {
          return { [INIT_EVENT]: void 0 };
        }
        // Form raw events
        else if (rawEventName === "START") {
          return { START: void 0 };
        } else if (rawEventName === "onSubmit") {
          e.persist();
          e.preventDefault();
          return { SEARCH: ref.current.value };
        } else if (rawEventName === "onCancelClick") {
          return { CANCEL_SEARCH: void 0 };
        }
        // Gallery
        else if (rawEventName === "onGalleryClick") {
          const item = e;
          return { SELECT_PHOTO: item };
        }
        // Photo detail
        else if (rawEventName === "onPhotoClick") {
          return { EXIT_PHOTO: void 0 };
        }
        // System events
        else if (rawEventName === "SEARCH_SUCCESS") {
          const items = e;
          return { SEARCH_SUCCESS: items };
        } else if (rawEventName === "SEARCH_FAILURE") {
          return { SEARCH_FAILURE: void 0 };
        }

        return NO_INTENT;
      }),
      filter(x => x !== NO_INTENT),
    ),
  commandHandlers: {
    [COMMAND_SEARCH]: (next, query, effectHandlers) => {
      effectHandlers
        .runSearchQuery(query)
        .then(data => {
          next(["SEARCH_SUCCESS",data.items]);
        })
        .catch(error => {
          next(["SEARCH_FAILURE", void 0]);
        });
    }
  },
  effectHandlers: {
    runSearchQuery: runSearchQuery,
    [COMMAND_RENDER]: (machineComponent, renderWith, params, next) => {
      // Applying flipping animations : read DOM before render, and flip after render
      flipping.read();
      machineComponent.setState(
        { render: React.createElement(renderWith, Object.assign({}, params, { next }), []) },
        () => flipping.flip()
      );
    }
  }
};

Note:

• we render the user interface with the GalleryApp component (renderWith)
• we use Rxjs for event handling between the component and the interfaced systems
• we kick start the machine with the START event (options.initialEvent)
• inputs received from the interfaced systems (network responses or user inputs) are translated into inputs for the state machine by the preprocessor (preprocessor)
• our interface only performs two actions on its interfaced systems : rendering screens, and querying remote content. As the rendering command is implemented by the <Machine /> component, commandHandlers only implement the COMMAND_SEARCH command (commandHandlers).
• the COMMAND_SEARCH command use the runSearchQuery effect runner (effectHandlers)
• the render command can be customized if necessary by specifying an alternative render implementation. Here we wanted to use the Flipping animation library, which requires running some commands before and after updating the DOM. That forced us to customize the rendering.

The final application set-up

We now have all the pieces to integrate for our application:

import ReactDOM from "react-dom";
import "./index.css";
import { Machine } from "react-state-driven";
import { imageGalleryFsmDef } from "./imageGalleryFsm";
import { imageGalleryReactMachineDef } from "./imageGalleryReactMachineDef";
import h from "react-hyperscript";
import {
  createStateMachine,
  decorateWithEntryActions,
  fsmContracts
} from "state-transducer";

const fsmSpecsWithEntryActions = decorateWithEntryActions(
  imageGalleryFsmDef,
  imageGalleryFsmDef.entryActions,
  null
);
const fsm = createStateMachine(fsmSpecsWithEntryActions, {
  debug: { console, checkContracts: fsmContracts }
});

ReactDOM.render(
  // That is the same as <Machine fsm=... preprocessor=... ... />
  h(Machine, Object.assign({}, imageGalleryReactMachineDef, { fsm }), []),
  document.getElementById("root")
);

Note:

• decorateWithEntryActions which a plugin which allows to have a given machine produce predefind actions on entering a control state. We use it here to render a given screen on entry in a given control state.
• debug options can be configured as needed. Currently trace messages can be output to a console passed by the API user. Additionally, machine contracts can be checked (useful in development mode)

A typical machine run

Alright, now let's leverage the example to explain what is going on here together with the <Machine /> semantics.

First of all, we use React.createElement but you could just as well use jsx <Machine ... />, that really is but an implementation detail. In our implementation we are mostly using core React API and hyperscript rather than jsx. Then keep in mind that when we write 'the machine', we refer to the state machine whose graph has been given previously. When we want to refer to the Machine React component, we will always specifically precise that.

Our state machine is basically a function which takes an input and returns outputs. The inputs received by the machine are meant to be mapped to events triggered by the user through the user interface. The outputs from the machine are commands representing what commands/effects to perform on the interfaced system(s). The mapping between user/system events and machine input is performed by preprocessor. The commands output by the machine are mapped to handlers gathered in commandHandlers so our Machine component knows how to run a command when it receives one.

A run of the machine would then be like this :

• The machine will encapsulate the following properties as part of its extended state : query, items, photo. This extended state will be updated according to the machine specifications in function of the input received by the machine and the control state the machine is in.
• The initial extended state is { query: '', items: [], photo: undefined }
• The machine transitions automatically from the initial state to the start control state.
  • on doing so, it issues one command : render GalleryApp. Render commands have a default handler which renders the renderWith component passed as parameter with the props included in the render command. An event emitter (next in code sample above) is passed to allow for the element to send events to the state machine.
• The Machine component executes the render command and renders a gallery app with an empty query text input, no images(items), and no selected image (photo).
• The user enters some text in the text input
• The user clicks the Search button.
  • A submit event is triggered.
  • The value of the input field is read, and the submit event is transformed into a machine input {SEARCH : <query>} which is passed to the machine
  • The machine, per its specifications, outputs two commands : COMMAND_SEARCH and render GalleryApp, and transitions to loading control state
  • The Machine component executes the two commands : the gallery is rendered (this time with a Cancel button appearing), and an API call is made. Depending on the eventual result of that API call, the command handler will trigger a SEARCH_SUCCESS or SEARCH_FAILURE event.
• The search is successful : the SEARCH_SUCCESS event is transformed into a machine input {SEARCH_SUCCESS: items}.
  • The machine, per its specifications, updates its extended state items property, and outputs a render GalleryApp command. This displays the list of fetched items on the screen.
• Any further event will lead to the same sequence :
  • the user or an interfaced system (network, etc.) triggers an event X,
  • that event will be transformed into a machine input (as per preprocessor),
  • the machine will, as per its specs, update its extended state and issue command(s)
  • Issued commands will be executed by the Machine component, as per commandHandlers

This is it! Whatever the machine passed as parameter to the Machine component, its behaviour will always be as described.

Note that this example is contrived for educational purposes:

• we could do away with the preprocessor and have the DOM event handlers directly produce inputs in the format accepted by the machine
• we could handle concurrency issues (user makes a second search while the first search request is in-flight) either reusing rxjs capabilities (switchMap) or at the machine level (extra piece of state)

Types

Types contracts can be found in the repository.

Contracts

• command handlers delegate all effects on external systems through the effect handler module
• the COMMAND_RENDER command is reserved and must not be used in the command handlers' specifications
• types contracts
• next is injected as a prop to the renderWith component and as such cannot be overriden by the component's defined props

Semantics

• The <Machine /> component :
  • initializes the raw event source (subject) which receives and forwards all raw events (user events and system events)
  • creates a global command handler to dispatch to user-defined command handlers
  • connects the raw event source to the preprocessor
  • connects the preprocessor to the machine
  • connects the machine to the command handler
  • starts the machine: the machine is now reactive to raw events and computes the associated commands
• The preprocessor will receive raw events from two sources : the user interface and the external systems (databases, etc.). From raw events, it will compute inputs for the connected state machine. Note that:
  • the preprocessor may perform effects only on the user interface (for instance e => e.preventDefault())
  • the preprocessor may have its own internal state
• The machine receives preprocessed events from the preprocessor and computes a set of commands to be executed
• The global command handler execute the incoming commands :
  • if the command is a render command, the global handler execute directly the command in the context of the <Machine/> component
  • if the command is not a render command, the global handler dispatches the command to the user-configured command handlers
• All command handlers are passed two arguments :
  • an event emitter connected to the raw event source
  • an object of type EffectHandlers which contains any relevant dependencies needed to perform effects (that is the object passed in props to the <Machine/> component)
• Render commands leads to definition of React components with DOM event handlers. Those event handlers can pass their raw events (DOM events) to the machine thanks to the raw event source emitter
• Non-render commands leads to the execution of procedures which may be successful or fail. The command handler can pass back information to the machine thanks to the injected event emitter.
• The raw event source is created with the subject factory passed as parameters. That subject must implement the Observer interface (in particular have the next, complete, error properties defined, with all of them being synchronous functions) and the Observable interface (subscribe property)
• The event source is terminated when the <Machine/> component is removed from the screen (componentWillUnmount lifecycle method)

testMachineComponent(testAPI, testScenario, machineDefinition)

Cf. Testing

Tips and gotchas

• most of the time preprocessor will just change the name of the event. You can perfectly if that makes sense, use preprocessor : x => x and directly pass on the raw events to the machine as input. That is fine
  • as long as the machine never has to perform an effect (this is one of the machine's contract) . In our example, you will notice that we are doing e.preventDefault() in the preprocessor. Furthermore, for documentation and design purposes, it makes sense to use any input nomenclature which links to the domain rather than the user interface. As we have seen, what is a button click on the interface is a search input for the machine, and results in a search command to the command handler.
  • if the machine at hand is only designed for that user interface and not intended to be reused in any other context. This approach as a matter of fact couple the view to the machine. In the case of our image gallery component, we could imagine a reusable parameterizable machine which implements the behaviour of a generic search input. Having a preprocessor enables to integrate such machines without a hiccup.
• some machine inputs may correspond to the aggregation of several events (in advanced usage). For instance, if we had to recreate a double click for the Search button, we would have to receive two clicks before passing a SEARCH input to the machine. Having an eventHandler interface allows to use Rxjs to deal with those cases, as its combinator library (map, filter, takeUntil etc.) allow to aggregate events in a fairly simple manner. Note that we could implement this logic in the state machine itself (our machines are essentially Turing machines, they can implement any effect-less computation), but:
  1. it may be better to keep the machine dealing with inputs at a consistent level of abstraction; 2. that kind of event aggregation is done easily enough with a dedicated library such as rxjs
• you may want to handle some concurrency issues at the machine level. Typically in our example, that would mean handling the user scenario when the user is requesting two different queries in rapid succession and the first query response has not arrived before the second query is executed. There is in this case a risk of the user interface displaying the wrong response.
• you may also want to do it at the command handler level to keep your machine at a higher level of abstraction. A command handler may for instance recreate Rxjs's switchMap by keeping a record of in-flight queries.
• the interfaced systems can communicate with the machine via an event emitter. The props.renderWith React component is injected a next prop which is an event emitter which relays events to the machine's raw event source. Associated with DOM event handlers, this allows the machine to receive DOM events. Command handlers are also passed the next event emitter, and can use it to send to the machine any messages from the interfaced systems.
• in those cases where the machine needs to communicate with other local but out of scope entities, it can emit its own events, for instance custom DOM events

Prior art and useful references

• User interfaces as reactive systems