Aug 3
Storybook — A UI Developer’s Dependable Friend!
Storybook is the most popular UI component development tool for React, Vue, and Angular. It helps you develop and design UI components outside your app in an isolated environment. It helps in building small atomic components and complex pages in any web application. If it’s a web UI, then you can build it with Storybook.
Storybook has been around since 2017, and the current latest release is v7.0.0-alpha.18.
Why Storybook?
Here are a few reasons why UI developers should explore and use Storybook:
1. Develop durable UIs
Storybook provides a sandbox to build UIs in isolation so you can develop hard-to-reach states and edge cases.
1.1 Build UIs in isolation
Implement components and pages without needing to fuss with data, APIs, or business logic.
1.2 Mock hard to reach use cases
Render components in key states that are tricky to reproduce in an app.
1.3 Keep track of use cases as stories
Save use cases as stories in plain JavaScript to revisit during development, testing, and QA.
1.4 Supercharge your workflow with addons
Use addons to customize your workflow, automate testing, and integrate with your favorite tools.
2. Test UIs with less effort and no flake
Stories are a pragmatic, reproducible way to keep track of UI edge cases. Write stories once then reuse them to power automated tests.
2.1 Spot test in a glance
Whenever you write a story you get a handy test case. Quickly browse stories to make sure your UI looks right.
2.2 Visual test appearance
Pinpoint UI changes down to the pixel by comparing image snapshots of stories.
2.3 Interaction test behavior
Verify interactions by simulating user behavior. Debug visually alongside your story. Integrates with Testing Library.
2.4 Accessibility test
Check stories for WCAG and ARIA issues in your browser with the A11y addon.
2.5 Snapshot test markup
Detect regressions in DOM markup and run smoke tests with code snapshots.
2.6 Unit test functionality
Reuse stories in your unit tests to confirm nuanced functionality.
3. Document UI for your team to reuse
Storybook brings together UI, examples, and documentation in one place. That helps teammates adopt existing UI patterns.
3.1 Find any component or page in your app
Storybook is a searchable, single source of truth for your UI.
3.2 Generate UI docs automatically
Write Markdown/MDX to generate a docs site for component libraries and design systems.
3.3 Reuse components across screens and apps
Every story is a use case that your team can find and reuse.
3.4 Track component history and versions
QA unexpected bugs by going back in time to compare components from previous Storybooks with the Chromatic addon.
4. Share to get sign off from teammates
Stories show how UIs actually work not just how they’re supposed to work. That makes gathering feedback and reproductions easy.
4.1 Publish to get feedback
Publish Storybook online to give your team a universal reference point for feedback.
4.2 Embed stories in your favorite sites
Embed stories to showcase live interactive examples in your docs. Works with Notion, Medium and any site supporting the oEmbed standard.
4.3 Compose multiple Storybooks together
Reference external Storybooks inside your local Storybook, no matter the view layer, tech stack, or dependencies.
4.4 import stories into other JavaScript tooling
Stories are a portable standard based on ES6 modules. Write stories once and import them into any JavaScript testing library.
Conclusion
Storybook is a must know for every Web UI developer, and can prove to be one of the most dependable toolkits.
References
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