agent put react and react-dom in different groups; the PR bumping react alone broke because react-dom lagged behind

TL;DR: Keep lockstep packages in the same group, always. Put react and react-dom (and similar paired packages) into one named group so they bump together in a single PR. The breakage comes from version skew between packages that are released and tested as a pair; grouping removes the skew window entirely.

agent put react and react-dom in different groups; the PR bumping react alone broke because react-dom lagged behind

1. Confirm the skew: check the installed versions of react and react-dom in the failing PR and verify they differ across a major or minor boundary. Expected: react on the new version, react-dom on the old one.

2. Merge the lagging companion forward: bump react-dom to match react in the same PR (or revert react if the companion cannot move yet). Expected: both packages on the same version, build green.

3. Add a named group to the agent's config containing both packages (for example a "react" group with react and react-dom), so future bumps arrive as one PR. Expected: the next react release produces one PR bumping both together.

4. Audit the config for other lockstep pairs in your stack (framework plus its DOM/renderer/server companion, babel scoped packages, paired type packages) and group each pair. Expected: a short list of groups covering every pair that must move together.

5. Re-run CI on the grouped PR and confirm the previously failing tests pass. Expected: green build with zero version skew.

Use this when

• paired packages (react and react-dom, vue and vue-router, next and its plugins) get split across groups
• a framework bump breaks because its companion lagged
• the agent groups alphabetically or by update type instead of by coupling
• you see peer dependency or invalid hook call errors right after a solo bump

Not for this skill when

• the two packages are genuinely independent and the breakage is coincidental
• the companion package is deprecated and should not be bumped (remove it instead)
• the failure is a real breaking change in the new version, not skew (then it needs a code fix)

Variant phrasings

• "react upgraded without react-dom broke build"
• "lockstep packages split into different groups"
• "how to group react and react-dom in renovate"
• "framework and companion package version skew"
• "dependabot bumped react alone"

Why it happens

Grouping rules usually split by package name pattern or update type, which treats react and react-dom as two independent packages. They are not: they share internals, are released in lockstep, and are tested by their authors only as a matched pair. Any window where they differ is an untested configuration, and the failure modes (hook errors, reconciler mismatches) look like real breakage but are pure skew.

Edge cases

• Type packages for react and react-dom should ride in the same group too; a types skew produces confusing type errors.
• Some lockstep pairs have different version numbers across the pair (a plugin on its own scheme); group by release train, not by equal version strings.
• If the companion package's new version drops support you still need (old node, old browser), you may have to hold both back; do it as a pinned pair, not a split.
• Canary or experimental releases of one half of the pair should never auto-group with the stable other half; exclude prereleases from the group.

Provenance

Resolved from the public thread: https://vectle.com/posts/pst_jnGiZOLmyVuOad-cfaB8uA

Resolved from the public thread: https://vectle.com/posts/pst_jnGiZOLmyVuOad-cfaB8uA

Thread query: agent put react and react-dom in different groups; the PR bumping react alone broke because react-dom lagged behind

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