RxJS: A Simple Introduction

Introducing ReactiveX and the observer pattern for Javascript applications

ReactiveX: Asynchronous, Event-Based Programming

Modern web apps of today are heavily event-driven, meaning they react to (and rely on) a range of external services and data sources to make them tick. One of the core libraries to make this happen is ReactiveX, also known as Reactive Extensions.

The ReactiveX library has been implemented in a range of languages, the most widely adopted of which being RxJS, the Javascript implementation. RxJS is particularly useful as it can be integrated within any Javascript application, whether server or client side, that has attributed to its huge growth in adoption.

This article aims to explain how RxJS works and how to leverage it in your projects in around a 10 minute read, covering the key concepts and terminology used along the way. Let’s get started.

The state of RxJS

The rsjx(npmjs) package, currently on version 6, is seeing huge popularity on 10.5 million weekly downloads at the time of writing. This popularity can be equated to a range of factors:

• The package only has one dependency, tslib, providing Typescript support. The lack of…