Reactjs async rendering of components

There are two ways to handle this, and which you choose depends on which component should own the data and the loading state.

1. Move the Ajax request into the parent and conditionally render the component:

   var Parent = React.createClass({
     getInitialState: function() {
       return { data: null };
     },
   
     componentDidMount: function() {
       $.get('http://foobar.io/api/v1/listings/categories/').done(function(data) {
         this.setState({data: data});
       }.bind(this));
     },
   
     render: function() {
       if (this.state.data) {
         return <CategoriesSetup data={this.state.data} />;
       }
   
       return <div>Loading...</div>;
     }
   });
   

2. Keep the Ajax request in the component and render something else conditionally while it’s loading:

   var CategoriesSetup = React.createClass({
     getInitialState: function() {
       return { data: null };
     },
   
     componentDidMount: function() {
       $.get('http://foobar.io/api/v1/listings/categories/').done(function(data) {
         this.setState({data: data});
       }.bind(this));
     },
   
     render: function() {
       if (this.state.data) {
         return <Input type="select">{this.state.data.map(this.renderRow)}</Input>;
       }
   
       return <div>Loading...</div>;
     },
   
     renderRow: function(row) {
       return <OptionRow obj={row} />;
     }
   });