Question

53

this.refs.something returns undefined

rated 0 times [ 57] [ 4] / answers: 1 / hits: 105648 / 8 Years ago, fri, february 5, 2016, 12:00:00

I have an element with a ref that is defined and ends up getting rendered into the page :

    <div ref=russian ...>

       ...

    </div>

I want to access the DOM element properties like offset... or something. However, I keep getting undefined and I haven't the faintest idea why. After some searching it's clear that refs are only applicable to one file but I'm not using this anywhere besides this one page. I'm saying this to log it:

console.log('REFS', this.refs.russian);

What could be causing this?

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tatyanna

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4 Years ago

answered 8 Years ago victorr · Accepted Answer

The correct place to work with refs is inside specific React lifecycle methods e.g. ComponentDidMount, ComponentDidUpdate

You cannot reference refs from the render() method. Read more about the cautions of working with refs here.

If you move your console.log('REFS', this.refs.russian); call to ComponentDidMount or ComponentDidUpdate lifecycle methods (assuming you are on React >= 14) you should not get undefined as a result.

UPDATE: also refs will not work on stateless components per the caution link above