Overwatch — A Lightweight Sensible State Manager

🚀 What’s New?

Overwatch now supports Server-Side Rendering SSR (v 1.0.7)

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A minimal API with developer flexibility, TypeScript-first state-management solution, inspired by the simplicity of Zustand, It's a super lightweight yet expressive state management library for React Js & Next Js, built on the singleton design pattern. It offers support for global and instance-specific middlewares, immutability, batched updates, and custom event communication — all designed to be used without extensive boilerplate.

Goal with OverWatch was to prioritize reusability, a positive developer experience, and clear component-level state and event tracking.

Read the full documentation at overwatchts.in/docs.

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🚀 What Is OverWatch?

OverWatch evolved from an internal utility that leveraged the singleton and pub-sub patterns. We've now refined it for React, incorporating hooks, strong typing, and automatic cleanup to make it accessible to everyone.

OverWatch is:

• Built with React hooks and TypeScript (offering 100% type safety for predictable development).
• Lightweight — you won't find context providers, reducers, or dispatches here.
• Ideal for managing both component-level and application-level shared state, providing flexibility for various needs.
• Inspired by Zustand: builds upon the simplicity and performance-first design of Zustand but reimagines it with a focus on advanced middleware, event-driven architecture, immutable state enforcement, and without the need for central store boilerplate.

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Why This Exists: State management should be straightforward & Sensible

If you've ever felt that Redux was too comprehensive for your needs, or that libraries like Zustand didn't offer enough specific control, OverWatch aims to provide a balanced approach. It combines a minimal API with flexibility to enhance your developer experience.

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Architecture: How It Works

At its core, OverWatch uses a pub-sub pattern to manage state effectively:

• Every state key functions as a communication channel.
• Components can subscribe to updates on these channels, acting as listeners.
• You can publish changes to state, either globally or specifically.
• Middleware pipelines run before changes are published, allowing for custom logic.
• Batching ensures that multiple updates are grouped efficiently, optimizing performance.
• Immutability is maintained, helping your state remain consistent and easy to reason about.

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How to Use: Getting Started

Installation

To get started with OverWatch-TS, simply install it using npm or yarn:

# Using npm
npm install overwatch-ts

# Using yarn
yarn add overwatch-ts

Step 1: createSharedState(key, initialValue)

This function initializes a shared state value globally. While optional, it's helpful for establishing a default state before any component mounts.

If createSharedState isn't used, useSharedState will automatically create the key the first time it's accessed, providing a flexible starting point.

// Setting an initial theme
createSharedState('theme', { mode: 'dark' });

Step 2: useSharedState(key)

Use this hook in any component to read and update your shared state. It's your primary interface for interacting with OverWatch.

import { useSharedState } from 'overwatch-ts'; 

const ThemeSwitcher = () => {
  const [theme, setTheme] = useSharedState<{ mode: string }>('theme');

  const toggleTheme = () => {
    setTheme({ mode: theme.mode === 'dark' ? 'light' : 'dark' });
  };

  return (
    <button onClick={toggleTheme}>
      Switch to {theme.mode === 'dark' ? 'Light' : 'Dark'} Mode
    </button>
  );
};

Step 3: usePicker(key, selectorFn)

This hook allows you to extract only a specific part of a shared state object, which can help optimize component rendering by preventing unnecessary re-renders.

import { usePicker } from 'overwatch-ts'; 

const ThemeIndicator = () => {
  const mode = usePicker('theme', t => t.mode);

  return <div>{mode === 'dark' ? '🌑' : '☀️'}</div>;
};

Why and when to use?

• It helps prevent unnecessary re-renders, improving application performance.
• It's particularly useful for larger state objects where you only need to react to changes in one specific field.

Step 4: applyMiddleware(key, middlewareFn)

Use this to attach one or more global middlewares to a shared state key. These middlewares will apply to all updates for that specific state key.

import { applyMiddleware, createSharedState } from 'overwatch-ts'; 

// A simple logger for all 'theme' state changes
const globalThemeLogger = (newValue, next) => {
  console.log('Global Theme Change:', newValue);
  next(newValue); // Remember to call 'next' to continue the update
};

createSharedState('theme', { mode: 'dark' });
applyMiddleware('theme', globalThemeLogger);

(NOTE: If both instance-specific and global middlewares are applied to the same state, instance-specific middlewares will run first.)

Step 5: Instance-specific Middleware (Component Level)

If you need middleware to apply only within a specific component, you can pass it directly when using useSharedState.

import { useSharedState } from 'overwatch-ts'; 

const MyComponentWithLocalLogging = () => {
  const localLogger = (val, next) => {
    console.log('This runs only in this specific component:', val);
    next(val);
  };

  const [theme, setTheme] = useSharedState('theme', {
    middleware: [localLogger],
  });

  // ...rest of your component
};

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Component Communication: Beyond State Management

Step 6: useBroadcast and useEvent

These hooks are designed for one-time communications, such as triggering a logout action, showing a modal, or sending a specific notification across your application. While distinct from state management, they integrate seamlessly for a comprehensive communication solution.

Broadcast an event:

import { useBroadcast } from 'overwatch-ts'; 

const LogoutButton = () => {
  const broadcast = useBroadcast();

  const handleLogout = () => {
    // Perform logout logic...
    broadcast('LOGOUT'); // Emit the 'LOGOUT' event
  };

  return <button onClick={handleLogout}>Logout</button>;
};

Listen for an event:

import { useEvent } from 'overwatch-ts'; 
import { useNavigate } from 'react-router-dom'; // Example for React Router

const AuthListener = () => {
  const navigate = useNavigate();

  useEvent('LOGOUT', () => {
    console.log('Logout event received. Redirecting...');
    navigate('/login');
  });

  return null; // This component primarily serves as a listener
};

What is Component Communication?

In many applications, especially those with deep component trees or when React Context feels too rigid, there's a need for cross-component communication that's both decoupled and clear. OverWatch's event system addresses this by:

• Offering a central event bus built on the pub-sub model.
• Leveraging custom React hooks for subscribing to and publishing events.
• Automatically unsubscribing events when components unmount, preventing memory leaks.
• Tracking which component subscribed to which event for better debugging.
• Being fully written in TypeScript and easily tree-shakable for efficient bundling.

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Ideal Use Cases: Where OverWatch Excels

• Decoupled communication between unrelated components.
• Managing temporary global states (e.g., flash messages, user actions).
• Providing an alternative to prop drilling or over-reliance on React Context.

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✨Server-Side Rendering (SSR) Support

Overwatch supports SSR (Server Side Rendering) via a dedicated ServerStore interface, giving you full control over how shared state is created, serialized, and hydrated across the client-server boundary.

How to use (✨Easy!)

• On the server, create a new store instance using createServerStore().
• Set and read state via that store during rendering.
• On the client, hydrate the store using Hyrated wrapper before your app renders.

That's it 3 steps

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🧩 The ServerStore Interface

Use createServerStore() to get a per-request store instance:

const serverStore = createServerStore();

Use serverStore.getSnapshot() to pass it to the client, and serverStore.hydrate() or useHydratedStore on the client to Hydrate client-side stores with no flickering.

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🧪 Example 1 – SSR in React (Node Server)

// Server: Express/Node
import { createServerStore } from 'overwatch-ts';

const serverStore = createServerStore();
serverStore.set('theme', 'dark'); // Inject initial state

const app = renderToString(
  <App store={serverStore} />
);

// Send snapshot to client
const initialState = serverStore.getSnapshot();
res.send(`
  <script>window.__OVERWATCH_SNAPSHOT__ = ${JSON.stringify(initialState)}</script>
`);

// Client: Hydrate snapshot
import { useHydratedStore } from 'overwatch-ts';

if (typeof window !== 'undefined' && window.__OVERWATCH_SNAPSHOT__) {
  useHydratedStore(window.__OVERWATCH_SNAPSHOT__);
}

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⚡ Example 2 – With Next.js (App Router)

'use client'

import { createServerStore } from 'overwatch-ts';

export const serverStore = createServerStore();

import { Hydrated } from 'overwatch-ts';
export async function getServerSideProps() {
  // Set some state server-side

  serverStore.set('theme', { mode: 'dark' });

  return {
    props: {
      initialSnapshot: serverStore.getSnapshot(),
    },
  };
}

export default function Home({ initialSnapshot }) {
  return (
    // Wrapper that renders children only after client is fully hydrated
     <Hydrated snapshot={initialSnapshot}>
      <ToogleTheme /> // client *components
    </Hydrated>
  );
}

On the client

"use client"
export const ToogleTheme = () => {
  const [theme, setTheme] = useSharedState('theme');
  return (<>
    <h1>{theme.mode}</h1>
  </>)
}

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✅ Summary

• Use createServerStore() to create scoped state per request.
• Populate initial state using createSharedState(...).
• Use store.getSnapshot() and pass it to the client.
• Hydrate on the client using Hydrated wrapper before using hooks.
• All hooks internally default to the global store unless a store is passed manually. (Not Recommended, only for advance use cases)

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📜 License

MIT — feel free to fork and adapt OverWatch for your projects.

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Built with purpose, and reusability in mind.