Setting Up a React Development Environment on macOS

React is a JavaScript library originally created by Facebook to build the Instagram website and open‑sourced in May 2013.

The article explains how to set up a React development environment on macOS, starting with installing Node.js.

Download the Node.js .pkg installer from the official website, run it, and verify the installation with node -v and npm -v .

Because the default npm registry is slow in China, the guide suggests using the Taobao mirror either via cnpm or by configuring npm directly:

npm install -g cnpm --registry=https://registry.npm.taobao.org
npm config set registry https://registry.npm.taobao.org

If cnpm is unavailable, configure npm with the Taobao registry:

npm config set registry https://registry.npm.taobao.org

Install additional packages, for example:

npm install gulp less --save-dev

Use create-react-app to bootstrap a new project without manual configuration:

cnpm install -g create-react-app
create-react-app my-app
cd my-app/
npm start

Open a browser at http://localhost:3000/ to see the running app.

To run an existing React project cloned from Git, install its dependencies with:

npm install

and start the development server (if provided) with:

node server