Reactjs - Get a component from anywhere in the app

Question

I'd like to know if there is a way to get a component by using some type of id, or by type, similar as you would do in DOM manipulation. Something like:

var Avatar = React.createClass({
    render: function () {
        ...
    }
});
React.renderComponent(Avatar({id:'avatar'}), ...);
...
...
var avatar = React.getComponentById('avatar');
avatar.setProps({url = 'http://...'});
// or
var avatars = React.getComponentByType('Avatar'); 
if (avatars.length) {
    avatars[0].setProps({url = 'http://...'});
}

I don't want to keep references of components instances...

Answer 1

setProps is something that you should use sparingly. In fact storing references to "rendered" components in general might indicate that you can structure your code differently. We also limit your uses of setProps to top level components.

var avatar = React.renderComponent(<Avatar .../>, node);
avatar.setProps({ foo: '1' });

is equivalent to this, which fits in a bit better with the declarative model:

React.renderComponent(<Avatar .../>, node);
React.renderComponent(<Avatar ... foo="1" />, node);

You could wrap that render up inside a function call so you could call it at will.