Spring in Action, Sixth Edition

11 Introducing Reactor

This chapter covers

• Understanding reactive programming
• Project Reactor
• Operating on data reactively

Have you ever held a subscription for a newspaper or a magazine? The internet has certainly taken a bite out of the subscriber base of traditional publications, but there was a time when a newspaper subscription was one of the best ways to keep up with the events of the day. You could count on a fresh delivery of current events every morning, to read during breakfast or on the way to work.

Now suppose that if, after paying for your subscription, several days go by and no papers have been delivered. A few more days go by, and you call the newspaper sales office to ask why you haven’t yet received your daily paper. Imagine ...