react / react/react-native

Inverted FlatList displays activity indicator at the bottom

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Bug Component: FlatList Good first issue Help Wanted :octocat: Type: Enhancement
Dominant language
C++
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Description

Is this a bug report?

yes

Have you read the Contributing Guidelines?

yes

Environment

Environment: all newer environments
Packages: any packages
Target Platform: any platform
Version: 0.53.0 and all other versions of RN that support FlatList with the inverted attribute

Steps to Reproduce
  1. return <FlatList {...props} inverted data={[...]} refreshing={this.state.isLoading} onRefresh={this.someListUpdatingFunction} />
    (just add the 'inverted' attribute to any RN <FlatList/> to reproduce, then try pulling down to refresh, then try pulling up to refresh)
Expected Behavior

onRefresh should allow users to refresh using the most common way that users have been trained to refresh data over the years, which is to "pull down to refresh" and see an ActivityIndicator spinning above the FlatList, never below it... this should be the default even when inverted={true}

Actual Behavior

user has to pull UP to refresh (with Activity Indicator at the bottom) ... literal vs intuitive: when taken "literally", i can agree that this is expected behavior since it is after all "inverted" ... however, when taken "intuitively", it's not so expected, especially for users... I don't think app users have ever been trained to pull up to refresh data, except for maybe in the "OfferUp" chat app!

Most Applicable Use Case
  • a chat app, where users pull down to load more chat history that's appended above, similar to how it's done in iOS Messages app
  • UIs like terminals, event logs, chat, etc... where it's common to insert new content from the bottom and load old content when the user scrolls to the top or pulls down to refresh
Demo

https://snack.expo.io/S1UOyWgSM
(to reproduce, just add the 'inverted' attribute to any RN <FlatList/> component using v0.53.0 or any version of RN that supports FlatList)

Contributor guide

Open the contributing guide

First steps

  1. Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
  2. Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

Research direction

Reproduce the behavior with the FlatList entry point using inverted, refreshing, and onRefresh, starting from the linked Expo Snack example. Trace how inverted lists position the refresh control and compare pull-down and pull-up behavior across supported platforms. Done means pull-down refresh shows the ActivityIndicator above the list while preserving the chat and history-loading use case.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
react-native
Domain
mobile
Issue type
Bug
Difficulty
4/5
Estimated time
3-5 days
Activity status
Active
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
48/100

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