[Question] Where do atoms and derived atoms values 'live'?

Hi @dai-shi, first of all thank you for this library. It is great to have different options, approaches and improvements around the React state topic. Good job!

I’m playing a bit with it and trying to better understand what’s happening under the hood, which use cases can be easily covered with jotai and which doesn’t (if any). And several questions arised. I didn’t check code yet, sorry, so my questions are based on guessing.

My first assumption when I saw the Provider wrapping the tree:

<Provider>
  <App />
</Provider>

and also based on this quote:

If you need React Context alternatives, Jotai comes with enough features

was to think that:

• Provider is kind of a contextual store where all the atom values live. Is that correct?

Also, for learning/debug purposes:

• Is there a way we can check atom values directly from its “store” without consuming them? Similar to what Redux DevTools offer.

[fjcalzado]

So your proposal is to add autoclean flag in Provider, and if it’s false, we don’t garbage collect. If not specified, the default is the current behavior (= garbage collected.)

Exactly, that was one of the proposal. The other one was to being able to assign atoms to a certain Provider, so you can completely mimick React Context and place Providers wherever you want along with its atoms.

but I wonder if developers can effectively use it

It can be harsh to understand and use it, I agree. It is a trade off, the more flexibility you offer, the more powerful the library would be. The less flexibility the easier to use although with limitations.

I am just trying to think what would happen with typical scenarios and check if jotai suits my needs. That’s what I am suggesting all this ideas. It doesn’t have to be like that, of course. I just find useful this kind of debate to be aware of possible limitations and solutions

[dai-shi]

Note that #640 changed the scope api a bit differently. (the internal is the same.) You are welcome!