React Finland

Organizing a conference is a bit like condensing time. You'll attract many people to the same space at once and make them share their knowledge. That's when you have the opportunity to learn and reflect.

In React Finland, one of the ways in which we achieve this is by organizing specifically themed sessions. One of the advantages of the approach is that it lets us to aggregate the conference content and that's what I've already done earlier.

In this post, I'll put together the recaps I've done for React Finland 2019 to give you a better idea of what happened in the conference.

State Management with Michel, David, Luca, and Farzad#

React Finland 2019 started with a session about state management with Michel Weststrate, David Khourshid, Luca Matteis, and Farzad Yz. The point was to discuss popular approaches and the future of state. Michel discussed his journey with MobX. Luca introduced append-only style of development to us. David and Farzad gave us a better idea of what to achieve with statecharts and state machines.

Design Systems with Andrey and Varya#

The day continued with a session about design systems by Andrey Okonetchnikov and Varya Stepanova. It's one of the hot topics at the moment as design systems aim to bridge the gap between designers and developers by providing a common language. Andrey's talk in particular is about the need for design systems while Varya shows how to get started in practice.

Testing with Juha, Maaret, and Manuel#

When altering code, you have a certain amount of confidence in the changes you are about to make. Ideally we would fix something or implement a new feature without breaking anything that already exists in the system. That's where testing comes in as it allows us to provide confidence that the code works as we expect it to.

In the testing session with Juha Linnanen, Maaret Pyhäjärvi, and Manuel Matuzović  we explored the different facets of testing by starting from CI/CD environment, then visiting different testing approaches, and finally figuring out how to test our React applications for accessibility.

Case Studies with Kadi, Glenn, and Dustin#

There's a lot going on React ecosystem and the purpose of the case study session with Kadi Kraman, Glenn Reyes, and Dustin Schau was to provide a better idea. Kadi started by exploring the benefits of TypeScript, Glenn discussed the eternal question of whether to write your own code or consume third party, and Dustin gave us a good idea of Gatsby themes.

Animations and unpopular opinions with Bruno and Nik#

We ended the first day of the conference in a session with about animations by Bruno Lourenço and unpopular opinions by Nik Graf before having a Smoosh comedy session.

React Native with Jamon, Rick, and Ville#

The second day of the conference started with a React Native session with Jamon Holmgren, Rick Hanlon, and Ville Immonen. The idea was to discuss where the platform is currently and where it's going.

Styling in React with Artem and Artem#

One of the topics that keeps staying relevant in the context of React is styling. In the styling session, Artem Sapegin and Artem Zakharchenko discussed how to approach styling and how to convert layouts into first class citizens in our applications.

Tooling with Tejas, Bohdan, Tomáš, and Christoffer#

The idea of the tooling session with Tejas Kumar, Bohdan Liashenko, Tomáš Konrády , and Christoffer Niska  was to show the state of the current tooling. Tejas showed us how to integrate a code editor within a styleguide, Bohdan discussed a tool meant for making it easier to understand and maintain codebases, Tomáš showed how to deal with legacy environments, and Christoffer discussed the current package publishing flows.

Performance with Anna and Sven#

In the performance session of the the conference with Anna Doubková  and Sven Sauleau we discussed the topic from two angles - React Native and WebAssembly.

Architecture with Monica and Carolyn#

The conference ended in an architecture session with Monica Lent and Carolyn Stransky. I wanted to end the conference on a soft note and it feels like we achieved in this.

Conclusion#

I feel React Finland 2019 was a great success with a lot of amazing content.

I hope to see you in React Finland 2020! You can buy tickets now.