Hi. I was wondering what would be the steps required if I wanted to support a react-native library that requires native code/linking, without ejecting?
Would I have to create my own Expo module, and would it require some approval from the Expo team?
The library I really need is GitHub - joltup/rn-fetch-blob: A project committed to making file access and data transfer easier, efficient for React Native developers. for uploading blobs.
Thanks.
I think your options are basically:
Of course adding stuff to Expo is not done lightly because everybody who does not need the library would still it included, making their apps a little bigger.
Gotcha, but that shouldn’t be the case if it is its own module, e.g. expo-rn-fetch-blob?
Thanks
No, it’s no different to any of the other modules with native code that Expo includes (unless I’m missing something). I mean, in some cases they might have made some modifications to the code to make it work better in the Expo client, I suppose, but for something like rn-fetch-blob I don’t think that would be necessary.
e.g. react-native-screens
If you’re not using Expo you need to install it (possibly using react-native link depending on your version of React Native). But the Expo team has done this already, so everybody using the Managed Workflow can just use react-native-screens or other things that depend on it (e.g. React Navigation). But if for some reason you didn’t need react-native-screens you’re still stuck with it taking up space in your app.
i.e. as far as I understand it, native code in a React Native app is basically either linked in or not. If it’s linked in you can use it. If it’s not, you can’t. I don’t think there’s anything like a module you can dynamically link in (like a plugin or KEXT or Linux kernel module etc.) after the native code is already compiled, which I think would be required for what you’re thinking of.
The Expo team is working to allow customising builds of standalone apps which would, I think, make it much easier to add things in without everybody paying the price.
They’re also working to make it much less painful to eject.
I don’t know when the above will be ready, but things should be closer when SDK 37 is released (planned for 31 March AFAIK.)
I really appreciate the detailed answer, this seems much more complex issue than I anticipated.
The main reason I (and others) need rn-fetch-blob is because fetch is very limited, it doesn’t support progress and it doesn’t seem to handle large files well. rn-fetch-blob can handle chunks and other things with ease in regards to downloading and uploading blobs.
I’ve seen many issues in rn-fetch-blob where people have tried using it in their Expo project, without success. Issues · joltup/rn-fetch-blob · GitHub
rn-fetch-blob implements native code, and so it cannot be used in expo based projects. You would need to eject from expo from my understanding
IMO rn-fetch-blob would be very valuable library for Expo. Hopefully there will be an easier way to add libraries with native code in the future. I think my best option is to eject at this time in order to unblock the development of my app, and hopefully un-eject in the near future.
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