Accessing this.state in React-Native

Question

Hi I'm new to React so bear with me. I'm want to store geoposition as a state. Seems nifty since any change in position will trigger a render, which is exactly what I want. During development I have a button that manual triggers the event by accessing the lastPosition. But when I do. The state is "undefined". Any clue why?

export default class FetchProject extends Component {
    constructor(props) {
        super(props);
        this.state = {
            initialPosition: 'unknown',
            lastPosition: 'unknown',
        };
    }

    //code that sets lastposition
    componentDidMount() {
        ....
    }

    _onPressGET (){
        console.log("PressGET -> " + this.state); //undefined
        var northing=this.state.initialPosition.coords.latitude; 
        //triggers error
    }

    render() {
       return (    
           <View style={styles.container}>
               <TouchableHighlight onPress = {this._onPressGET} style = {styles.button}>
                  <Text>Fetch mailbox</Text>
               </TouchableHighlight>
           </View>
       );
    }
}

Answer 1

When using ES6 classes in RN, watch for binding this - this may not be what you think unless you bind it.

onPress = { this._onPressGet.bind(this) }

or in the constructor

constructor(props) {
  super(props);

  this.state = {
    initialPosition: 'unknown',
    lastPosition: 'unknown'
  };

  this._onPressGet = this._onPressGet.bind(this);
}

or maybe the most elegant way

_onPressGet = () => {
  // Function body
}

In order from least to most preferential.