Fixing the Loading State Issue in Ant Design Table with React.StrictMode and AbortController

Discover how to resolve loading state problems in React components using Ant Design Table when utilizing `React.StrictMode` and `AbortController`. This guide offers clear solutions and best practices.
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Understanding the Loading State Issue in React with Ant Design

The Problem

In a typical React component, we would expect to set a loading state to true when starting to fetch data, and then set it back to false once the data fetch is complete. With Ant Design’s Table component, this loading state is crucial for providing the user feedback during data retrieval.

The simplified version of your component might look like this:

[[See Video to Reveal this Text or Code Snippet]]

The Effect of Strict Mode

With React.StrictMode enabled, the useEffect hook runs twice for each render in development mode (but not in production). This can lead to two critical issues regarding the loading state:

The loading state can be set to false prematurely if the first fetch is still in progress when the second useEffect runs.

The abort mechanism may intervene incorrectly, leading to the loading state toggling unexpectedly.

Proposed Solutions

Solution 1: Conditional Loading State Management

One immediate approach is to conditionally set the loading state to false only if the request was not aborted:

[[See Video to Reveal this Text or Code Snippet]]

This ensures that we only stop the loading indicator if the fetch was successful.

Solution 2: Control Loading with an Error State

Instead of relying solely on the loading state, you can introduce an error state and derive the loading state based on data availability and error occurrences:

[[See Video to Reveal this Text or Code Snippet]]

This way, the table is determined to be loading based on the length of the fetched data and the occurrence of any errors.

Solution 3: Understanding the Nature of Strict Mode

Keep in mind that React.StrictMode only affects development. In production, useEffect will only run once per mount. Therefore, if it’s not critical for your application, you can choose to leave your code as is and rely on behavior in production.

Conclusion

In summary, when facing loading state issues in React components using Ant Design tables while both AbortController and React.StrictMode are enabled, consider adjusting how the loading state is managed. Whether you conditionally handle loading states, introduce an explicit error state, or simply acknowledge the development-only behavior of Strict Mode, each solution can guide you towards creating a smoother user experience. Choose what best fits your application needs, and happy coding!