Photo by Juanjo Jaramillo on Unsplash

Calling APIs is the most common thing to do in any modern web application. When it comes to talking with an API then most of the time we need to do a lot of repetitive things like getting data from an API call, handling the success or error case, and so on.

When calling tens of hundreds of API calls we always have to do those tedious tasks. We can handle those things efficiently by putting a higher level of abstraction over those barebone API calls, whereas in some small applications, sometimes we don’t even care.

The problem comes when we start adding new features on top of the existing features without handling the API calls in an efficient and reusable manner. In that case for all of those API calls related repetitions, we end up with a lot of repetitive code across the whole application.

In React, we have different approaches for calling an API. Nowadays mostly we use React hooks. With React hooks, it’s possible to handle API calls in a very clean and consistent way throughout the application in spite of whatever the application size is. So let’s see how we can make a clean and reusable API calling layer using React hooks for a simple web application.

I’m using a code sandbox for this blog which you can get here.

import "./styles.css";
import React, { useEffect, useState } from "react";
import axios from "axios";

export default function App() {
  const [posts, setPosts] = useState(null);
  const [error, setError] = useState("");
  const [loading, setLoading] = useState(false);

  useEffect(() => {
    handlePosts();
  }, []);

  const handlePosts = async () => {
    setLoading(true);
    try {
      const result = await axios.get(
        "https://jsonplaceholder.typicode.com/posts"
      );
      setPosts(result.data);
    } catch (err) {
      setError(err.message || "Unexpected Error!");
    } finally {
      setLoading(false);
    }
  };

  return (
    <div className="App">
      <div>
        <h1>Posts</h1>
        {loading && <p>Posts are loading!</p>}
        {error && <p>{error}</p>}
        <ul>
          {posts?.map((post) => (
            <li key={post.id}>{post.title}</li>
          ))}
        </ul>
      </div>
    </div>
  );
}

I know the example above isn’t the best code but at least it’s working and it’s valid code. I will try to improve that later. For now, we can just focus on the bare minimum things for calling an API.

Here, you can try to get posts data from JsonPlaceholer. Those are the most common steps we follow for calling an API like requesting data, handling loading, success, and error cases.

If we try to call another API from the same component then how that would gonna look? Let’s see.

500: Internal Server Error

Now it’s going insane! For calling two simple APIs we’ve done a lot of duplication. On a top-level view, the component is doing nothing but just making two GET requests and handling the success and error cases. For each request, it’s maintaining three states which will periodically increase later if we’ve more calls.

Let’s refactor to make the code more reusable with fewer repetitions.

Step 1: Create a Hook for the Redundant API Request Codes

Most of the repetitions we have done so far are about requesting data, handing the async things, handling errors, success, and loading states. How about encapsulating those things inside a hook?

The only unique things we are doing inside handleComments and handlePosts are calling different endpoints. The rest of the things are pretty much the same. So we can create a hook that will handle the redundant works for us and from outside we’ll let it know which API to call.

500: Internal Server Error

Here, this request function is identical to what we were doing on the handlePosts and handleComments. The only difference is, it’s calling an async function apiFunc which we will provide as a parameter with this hook. This apiFunc is the only independent thing among any of the API calls we need.

With hooks in action, let’s change our old codes in App component, like this:

500: Internal Server Error

How about the current code? Isn’t it beautiful without any repetitions and duplicate API call handling things?

Let’s continue our journey from the current code. We can make App component more elegant. Now it knows a lot of details about the underlying library for the API call. It shouldn’t know that. So, here’s the next step…

Step 2: One Component Should Take Just One Responsibility

Our App component knows too much about the API calling mechanism. Its responsibility should just request the data. How the data will be requested under the hood, it shouldn’t care about that.

We will extract the API client-related codes from the App component. Also, we will group all the API request-related codes based on the API resource. Now, this is our API client:

import axios from "axios";

const apiClient = axios.create({
  // Later read this URL from an environment variable
  baseURL: "https://jsonplaceholder.typicode.com"
});

export default apiClient;

All API calls for comments resource will be in the following file:

import client from "./client";

const getComments = () => client.get("/comments");

export default {
  getComments
};

All API calls for posts resource are placed in the following file:

import client from "./client";

const getPosts = () => client.get("/posts");

export default {
  getPosts
};

Finally, the App component looks like the following:

import "./styles.css";
import React, { useEffect } from "react";
import commentsApi from "./api/comments";
import postsApi from "./api/posts";
import useApi from "./hooks/useApi";

export default function App() {
  const getPostsApi = useApi(postsApi.getPosts);
  const getCommentsApi = useApi(commentsApi.getComments);

  useEffect(() => {
    getPostsApi.request();
    getCommentsApi.request();
  }, []);

  return (
    <div className="App">
      {/* Post List */}
      <div>
        <h1>Posts</h1>
        {getPostsApi.loading && <p>Posts are loading!</p>}
        {getPostsApi.error && <p>{getPostsApi.error}</p>}
        <ul>
          {getPostsApi.data?.map((post) => (
            <li key={post.id}>{post.title}</li>
          ))}
        </ul>
      </div>
      {/* Comment List */}
      <div>
        <h1>Comments</h1>
        {getCommentsApi.loading && <p>Comments are loading!</p>}
        {getCommentsApi.error && <p>{getCommentsApi.error}</p>}
        <ul>
          {getCommentsApi.data?.map((comment) => (
            <li key={comment.id}>{comment.name}</li>
          ))}
        </ul>
      </div>
    </div>
  );
}

Now it doesn’t know anything about how the APIs get called. Tomorrow if we want to change the API calling library from axios to fetch or anything else, our App component code will not get affected. We can just change the codes form client.js This is the beauty of abstraction.

Apart from the abstraction of API calls, Appcomponent isn’t right the place to show the list of the posts and comments. It’s a high-level component. It shouldn’t handle such low-level data interpolation things.

So we should move this data display-related things to another low-level component. Here I placed those directly in the App component just for the demonstration purpose and not to distract with component composition-related things.

Final Thoughts

The React library gives the flexibility for using any kind of third-party library based on the application’s needs. As it doesn’t have any predefined architecture so different teams/developers adopted different approaches to developing applications with React. There’s nothing good or bad. We choose the development practice based on our needs/choices. One thing that is there beyond any choices is writing clean and maintainable codes.

Although Mexico and Ukraine are thousands of miles apart, this legislation would link their responses.

Context

Ukraine was a Soviet republic until 1991. A significant proportion of the population, particularly in the east, is ethnically Russian. In February, the Russian military invaded Ukraine, intent on overthrowing its democratically elected government.

This could be the biggest European land invasion since WWII. In response, President Joe Biden sent 3,000 troops to NATO countries bordering Ukraine to help with Ukrainian refugees, with more troops possible if the situation worsened.

In July 2021, the US Border Patrol reported its highest monthly encounter total since March 2000. Some Republicans compare Biden's response to the Mexican border situation to his response to the Ukrainian border situation, though the correlation is unclear.

What the bills do

Two new Republican bills seek to link the US response to Ukraine to the situation in Mexico.

The Secure America's Borders First Act would prohibit federal funding for Ukraine until the US-Mexico border is “operationally controlled,” including a wall as promised by former President Donald Trump. (The bill even mandates a 30-foot-high wall.)

The USB (Ukraine and Southern Border) Act, introduced on February 8 by Rep. Matt Rosendale (R-MT0), would allow the US to support Ukraine, but only if the number of Armed Forces deployed there is less than the number deployed to the Mexican border. Madison Cawthorne introduced H.R. 6665 on February 9th (R-NC11).

What backers say

Supporters argue that even if the US should militarily assist Ukraine, our own domestic border situation should take precedence.

After failing to secure our own border and protect our own territorial integrity, ‘America Last' politicians on both sides of the aisle now tell us that we must do so for Ukraine. “Before rushing America into another foreign conflict over an Eastern European nation's border thousands of miles from our shores, they should first secure our southern border.”

“If Joe Biden truly cared about Americans, he would prioritize national security over international affairs,” Rep. Cawthorn said in a separate press release. The least we can do to secure our own country is send the same number of troops to the US-Mexico border to assist our border patrol agents working diligently to secure America.

What opponents say

The president has defended his Ukraine and Mexico policies, stating that both seek peace and diplomacy.

Our nations [the US and Mexico] have a long and complicated history, and we haven't always been perfect neighbors, but we have seen the power and purpose of cooperation,” Biden said in 2021. “We're safer when we work together, whether it's to manage our shared border or stop the pandemic. [In both the Obama and Biden administration], we made a commitment that we look at Mexico as an equal, not as somebody who is south of our border.”

No mistake: If Russia goes ahead with its plans, it will be responsible for a catastrophic and unnecessary war of choice. To protect our collective security, the United States and our allies are ready to defend every inch of NATO territory. We won't send troops into Ukraine, but we will continue to support the Ukrainian people... But, I repeat, Russia can choose diplomacy. It is not too late to de-escalate and return to the negotiating table.”

Odds of passage

The Secure America's Borders First Act has nine Republican sponsors. Either the House Armed Services or Foreign Affairs Committees may vote on it.

Rep. Paul Gosar, a Republican, co-sponsored the USB Act (R-AZ4). The House Armed Services Committee may vote on it.

With Republicans in control, passage is unlikely.