React — A Common Misconception

There is a common misconception that learning React has to deal with a lot of technologies and tools. That you’ll have to deal with libraries, package managers, transpilers, module bundlers and so on. (It is said that it’ll set in JavaScript Fatigue).

This perception is unfounded. Actually it doesn’t require a lot to start with React.

All you need is an npm/node.js environment and the create-react-app tool and preferably an IDE (such as Visual Studio Code).

You can download node.js from here.

Then you can traverse to the folder where you want to have your React application and type this command.

npx create-react-app my-app

This will create a starting application called my-app in the folder that you’re in.

Then change directory to the my-app folder and type npm start.

cd my-app
npm start

This will start the React application. From then on you can change the application and do the more complex tasks that you have in mind.