A programming paradigm focused on asynchronous data streams and the propagation of changes, where programs react to data events automatically. It treats data as streams that can be observed, transformed, and combined using functional programming concepts.
The concept emerged from functional reactive programming research in the 1990s, but gained mainstream adoption with libraries like RxJava (2013) and RxJS. 'Reactive' emphasizes the system's ability to react to changes in data streams rather than actively polling for updates.
Reactive programming is like having a smart home that automatically responds to changes - when motion is detected, lights turn on; when temperature drops, heating activates; when your phone connects to WiFi, music starts playing! Everything flows as streams of events, and your code simply describes how to react to these streams rather than manually checking for changes.
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