Access property type for documentation purposes at run time

[zerekw]

Looking at how storybook and random questions on the internet it looks like it would be preferable to be able to pull the type of the property after it has been set.

I have a simple POC I can submit as a PR if that would be preferred. Code below as to what I would be expecting to have as an end result.

// this would be set with the validator
function getType() {
      return {
        type: type,
        subType: subType
      }
    }

propEnum.getType() => {type: "enum", subType: Array(4)}
propString.getType() => {type: "string", subType: undefined}

[oomathias]

It looks like an interesting idea, I'm playing with react-docgen which doesn't work well in every case. I've seen packages like react-desc that tries to do that by surcharging prop-types.

Being able to retrieve the propTypes in a JSON format would be so much easier. The only thing missing would be the description/comment.

What I actually need:

• prop name
• type
• isRequired
• description

[dennisreimann]

Has the idea of adding something like a description function to prop-types been discussed before? I couldn't find something via the search and came here looking for a similar solution as I am also working on a documentation tool.

Person.propTypes = {
  name: PropTypes.string.isRequired.description("The persons first and last name")
}

Another idea we had was adding a proprietary attribute like propDescriptions, similar to defaultProps:

Person.propDescriptions = {
  name: "The persons first and last name"
}

See also diegohaz/parse-prop-types#6

[ljharb]

Isn't the name of the prop the description already?

[dennisreimann]

Oftentimes yes, but in some cases its useful to describe the prop a bit further.