Debugging a React Bug That Wasn't Mine: A Dev's Breakdown

Hey there! I'm Abhijeet, a dev who just spent an entire day pulling his hair out over a bug that turned out to be... not my bug at all. Grab some popcorn, maybe a debugger too, because this is the story of how Brave browser gaslit me and my console cried in minified.
Let's dive into the rabbit hole, one console error at a time.

Everything Was Fine... Until It Wasn't

So I'm vibing, building this slick React project using Vite. Nothing fancy, just your average component soup with some nice icons sprinkled in.
I deployed it on Netlify, excited to finally show it off. Opened it in Brave browser, loaded the app, and boom:

🚨 Icons ghosted me. 🚨 Text went poof. 🚨 Console dropped this bomb:

Uncaught Error: Minified React error #130

If you've ever seen this, you know React is basically saying:

"I broke. You figure it out."

I clicked the link React provided and it told me:

Element type is invalid: expected a string (for built-in components) or a 
class/function (for composite components) but got: undefined.

Translation: You're probably importing a component that doesn't exist. Classic. But I double-checked all my imports...

Fun fact: This all went down while building 🎬FlickNest — a movie discovery app where you can search trending titles, explore binge-worthy shows, and keep up with the latest releases.

It Must Be the Icons

Naturally, I thought maybe I messed up icon imports. React #130 is infamous for this.

import { FaXTwitter } from "react-icons/fa6"; // ✅

Still the error stayed, and so did my growing headache.
I swapped out react-icons for lucide-react, thinking maybe Brave didn't like the old icon set. You know, new icons, new luck?

Spoiler: no luck.

Clearly, this wasn't about icons anymore. This was personal.

Brave is Blocking My Files?

Then I noticed something odd in DevTools. The error trace pointed to a file named:
ads.914af30a.js

The name. "ads"? Like, ads-ads?

Instant flashback: Brave hates anything that even smells like an ad. Could it be blocking my own JS chunks?

So I popped open my vite.config.ts and told Vite:

"Hey buddy, let's name things like cryptographic garbage instead of triggering Brave's fight-or-flight."

Here's the config:

// vite.config.ts
build: {
  rollupOptions: {
    output: {
      chunkFileNames: 'assets/[hash].js',      // Dynamic chunks
      entryFileNames: 'assets/[hash].js',      // Entry points
      assetFileNames: 'assets/[hash][extname]' // Assets like CSS/images
    }
  }
}

This ensures Vite won't generate scary filenames like ads.chunk.js. Totally browser-friendly.
I rebuilt. Refreshed. And guess what?
Still broken.

The Plot Twist I Didn't See Coming

Out of desperation, I clicked the error trace again — this time determined to follow every breadcrumb. I expanded the stack trace in DevTools, expecting to see something from my source files.

But instead, I noticed a weird nested structure:

content script > CSS Peeper > ads.[hash].js

Hold up. CSS Peeper?

That's a Chrome/Brave extension I use to peek at styles. Apparently, it injects its own React app into every webpage like it owns the place.
And that app... was crashing.

Let me repeat:

I had been debugging someone else's React crash.

For. Eight. Hours.

The Real Villain Was Installed in My Browser All Along

Here's what was really happening:

• CSS Peeper injects its own React-powered UI into every webpage
• It loads a script called something like ads.something.js (coincidence? I think not.)
• That script broke. Probably missing an icon or internal dependency
• React saw the crash and yelled
• But the console blamed my app
• To make things worse, Brave saw the filename ads.[hash].js and probably flagged or throttled it due to its aggressive ad-blocking rules — even though it wasn’t an actual ad.

Plot twist: I wasn't the villain. I was just collateral damage.

The Fix (That Took Me 5 Seconds... After 8 Hours)

The fix? Comically simple.

1. Open brave://extensions
2. Turn off CSS Peeper
3. Reload the page

Boom. Everything just worked.
Icons? Back. Text? Back. Me? Slightly traumatized.

What I Learned (So You Don't Lose a Day Like Me)

1. Test in Incognito Mode First
No extensions = no hijinks. This should be your first debugging step when things get weird.

2. Minified Errors Are Gaslighting You
Use dev mode for real errors:
npm run dev
React will be way more helpful when it's not trying to save bytes.

3. Be Careful With File Names
Browsers like Brave can block:

• JS/CSS files named ads.js, sponsor.css, etc.
• DOM elements with classes like .ad-banner

Even if they're not ads. So avoid those terms when naming stuff.

4. Double-Check Icon Imports
My imports were fine, but always verify

import { ChevronLeft } from 'lucide-react';
console.log(ChevronLeft); // Should not be undefined

5. Look for "content script" in DevTools
If you see "content script" or an extension name in the error stack, it's probably not your fault.

TL;DR
Seeing React error #130 in Brave? Icons or text gone missing?
Before you nuke your app:

• Try Incognito mode
• Check if any extensions are crashing
• Avoid ad-looking file names

Sometimes the real bug lives rent-free in your browser.

Final Thoughts

I lost an entire day to an error that wasn't mine. But now you don't have to.
If you're ever staring at your DevTools wondering what went wrong — remember to ask yourself:

"Is this me? Or is this just Brave begin Brave?"

Happy debugging. 🚀