In HTML, a <textarea> element defines its text by its children:
<textarea>
Hello there, this is some text in a text area
</textarea>
In React, a <textarea> uses a value attribute instead. This way, a form using a <textarea> can be written very similarly to a form that uses a single-line input:
class EssayForm extends React.Component {
constructor(props) {
super(props);
this.state = {
value: ‘Please write an essay about your favorite DOM element.’
};
this.handleChange = this.handleChange.bind(this);
this.handleSubmit = this.handleSubmit.bind(this);
}
handleChange(event) {
this.setState({value: event.target.value});
}
handleSubmit(event) {
alert(‘An essay was submitted: ‘ + this.state.value);
event.preventDefault();
}
render() {
return (
<form onSubmit={this.handleSubmit}>
<label>
Essay:
<textarea value={this.state.value} onChange={this.handleChange} />
</label>
<input type=”submit” value=”Submit” />
</form>
);
}
}
Notice that this.state.value is initialized in the constructor, so that the text area starts off with some text in it.
