In the React documentation for "Integrating with Other Libraries", it mentions at least two ways to integrate other libraries. One involves wrapping the code with a React component (example at the bottom).
If I use this approach, would I basically not be able to pass in properties to the component? What if this component is a child of a regular React component which itself could render nothing? Could that cause any problems with the non-React component?
https://reactjs.org/docs/integrating-with-other-libraries.html
class SomePlugin extends React.Component {
  componentDidMount() {
    this.$el = $(this.el);
    this.$el.somePlugin();
  }
  componentWillUnmount() {
    this.$el.somePlugin('destroy');
  }
  render() {
    return <div ref={el => this.el = el} />;
  }
}