Understanding RxJava: Differences between Runnable callback - callback

Question

I'm trying to understand RxJava and I'm sure this question is a nonsense... I have this code using RxJava:
public Observable<T> getData(int id) {
if (dataAlreadyLoaded()) {
return Observable.create(new Observable.OnSubscribe<T>(){
T data = getDataFromMemory(id);
subscriber.onNext(data);
});
}
return Observable.create(new Observable.OnSubscribe<T>(){
#Override
public void call(Subscriber<? super String> subscriber) {
T data = getDataFromRemoteService(id);
subscriber.onNext(data);
}
});
}
And, for instance, I could use it this way:
Action1<String> action = new Action<String>() {
#Override
public void call(String s) {
//Do something with s
}
};
getData(3).subscribe(action);
and this another with callback that implements Runnable:
public void getData(int id, MyClassRunnable callback) {
if (dataAlreadyLoaded()) {
T data = getDataFromMemory(id);
callback.setData(data);
callback.run();
} else {
T data = getDataFromRemoteService(id);
callback.setData(data);
callback.run();
}
}
And I would use it this way:
getData(3, new MyClassRunnable()); //Do something in run method
Which are the differences? Why is the first one better?
The question is not about the framework itself but the paradigm. I'm trying to understand the use cases of reactive.
I appreciate any help. Thanks.

Answer 1

First of all, your RxJava version is much more complex than it needs to be. Here's a much simpler version:
public Observable<T> getData(int id) {
return Observable.fromCallable(() ->
dataAlreadyLoaded() ? getDataFromMemory(id) : getDataFromRemoteService(id)
);
}
Regardless, the problem you present is so trivial that there is no discernible difference between the two solutions. It's like asking which one is better for assigning integer values - var = var + 1 or var++. In this particular case they are identical, but when using assignment there are many more possibilities (adding values other than one, subtracting, multiplying, dividing, taking into account other variables, etc).
So what is it you can do with reactive? I like the summary on reactivex's website:
Easily create event streams or data streams. For a single piece of data this isn't so important, but when you have a stream of data the paradigm makes a lot more sense.
Compose and transform streams with query-like operators. In your above example there are no operators and a single stream. Operators let you transform data in handy ways, and combining multiple callbacks is much harder than combining multiple Observables.
Subscribe to any observable stream to perform side effects. You're only listening to a single event. Reactive is well-suited for listening to multiple events. It's also great for things like error handling - you can create a long sequence of events, but any errors are forwarded to the eventual subscriber.
Let's look at a more concrete with an example that has more intrigue: validating an email and password. You've got two text fields and a button. You want the button to become enabled once there is a email (let's say .*#.*) and password (of at least 8 characters) entered.
I've got two Observables that represent whatever the user has currently entered into the text fields:
Observable<String> email = /* you figure this out */;
Observable<String> password = /* and this, too */;
For validating each input, I can map the input String to true or false.
Observable<Boolean> validEmail = email.map(str -> str.matches(".*#.*"));
Observable<Boolean> validPw = password.map(str -> str.length() >= 8);
Then I can combine them to determine if I should enable the button or not:
Observable.combineLatest(validEmail, validPw, (b1, b2) -> b1 && b2)
.subscribe(enableButton -> /* enable button based on bool */);
Now, every time the user types something new into either text field, the button's state gets updated. I've setup the logic so that the button just reacts to the state of the text fields.
This simple example doesn't show it all, but it shows how things get a lot more interesting after you get past a simple subscription. Obviously, you can do this without the reactive paradigm, but it's simpler with reactive operators.