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Why is doOnDispose not called?

When creating an Observable like this:
public void foo() {
Observable observable = Observable.fromCallable(() -> {
bar();
return "";
})
.doOnSubscribe(disposable -> System.out.println("onSubscribe"))
.doOnDispose(() -> System.out.println("onDispose"));
Disposable disposable = observable.subscribe();
disposable.dispose();
}
private void bar() {
System.out.println("bar");
}
doOnSubcribe is called, doOnDispose is not called.
Why is that?

You need to use the doFinally() operator.
doOnDispose() has a very narrow use case, where the observable is explicitly disposed. In your example, the observable terminates "naturally" by onComplete(). By the time that you call dispose(), the observable is done, and nothing will happen -- disposing a completed observable has no effect.

RxJava2 dispose() doesn't work if called on the object returned by doOnSubscribe()

I've got a problem with understanding why the following code doesn't work. Am I doing something wrong or is it some kind of bug in RxJava2 implementation?
private Disposable savedDisposable;
#Test
public void test() {
final TestObserver<Integer> observer = new TestObserver<>();
Observable<Integer> t = Observable.just(10)
.delay(100, TimeUnit.MILLISECONDS)
.doOnSubscribe(disposable -> savedDisposable = disposable);
t.subscribe(observer);
savedDisposable.dispose(); //this doesn't work
//observer.dispose(); //this works
assertTrue(observer.isDisposed());
}

To answer the posted question:
You are disposing in the middle thus the end Disposable can't know about its upstream has been disposed because dispose() calls always travel upstream.
There are the DisposableObserver, ResourceObserver, subscribeWith and the lambda-subscribe() methods that will get you a Disposable object at the very end which you can dispose via dispose().
On the issue list though, it turned out the OP wanted an Observer and Disposable to be present on the consumer type and discovered that this can be achieved via constrained generics, for example:
public static <T, K extends Observer<T> & Disposable> K subscribe(
Observable<T> o, K observer) {
o.subscribe(observer);
return observer;
}

Subscribe based on other emissions

I have an observable that emits values. Based on these values I need to subscribe/unsubscribe to/from another Observable.
Is there a handy way of doing so? A convenient way instead creating a field for the subscription and handling it manually?
Example:
Observable A emits Booleans. If it emits true then a subscription should be made to Observable B - if false this subscription should be unsubscribed.

I'm not sure if we're 100% on the same page but I think you're missing one point. Maybe you'll think I'm nitpicking, but I think it will be good to get our terms straight.
Observable starts emitting values when a Subscriber subscribes to it. So unless you're thinking about two separate Subscribers you can't react to an emitted value with a subscription because the Observer won't emit anything.
That said... what (I think) you wanna do could be done this way:
Observable<Boolean> observableA = /* observable A initialization */;
final Observable<SomeObject> observableB = /* observable B initialization */;
observableA
.flatMap(new Func1<Boolean, Observable<SomeObject>>() {
#Override
public Observable<SomeObject> call(Boolean aBoolean) {
if (!aBoolean) {
throw new IllegalStateException("A dummy exception that is here just to cause the subscription to finish with error.");
}
return observableB;
}
})
.subscribe(
new Action1<SomeObject>() {
#Override
public void call(SomeObject someObject) {
// THIS IS A PART OF THE SUBSCRIBER TO OBSERVABLE B.
// THIS METHOD WILL BE CALLED ONLY IF THE OBSERVABLE A RETURNED TRUE
}
},
new Action1<Throwable>() {
#Override
public void call(Throwable throwable) {
// A dummy Action1 so the subscription does not crash on the Exception
}
});

If all of observables has the same type or you can combine whatever you want based on values.
Observable.from(new int[]{1,2,3,4,5})
.filter(i -> i < 5) // filter out something
.flatMap(i -> {
if (i < 2) { // subscribe on some observable, based on item value
return Observable.just(i);
} else {
return Observable.just(3);
}
})

Rx Java mergeDelayError not working as expected

I'm using RxJava in and Android application with RxAndroid. I'm using mergeDelayError to combine two retro fit network calls into one observable which will process emitted items if either emits one and the error if either has one. This is not working and it is only firing off the onError action when either encounters an error. Now to test this I shifted to a very simple example and still the successAction is never called when I have an onError call. See example below.
Observable.mergeDelayError(
Observable.error(new RuntimeException()),
Observable.just("Hello")
)
.observeOn(AndroidSchedulers.mainThread())
.subscribeOn(Schedulers.io())
.finallyDo(completeAction)
.subscribe(successAction, errorAction);
The success action will only be called if I use two success observables. Am I missing something with how mergeDelayError is supposed to work?
EDIT:
I've found that if I remove the observeOn and subscribeOn everything works as expected. I need to specify threads and thought that was the whole point of using Rx. Any idea why specifying those Schedulers would break the behavior?

Use .observeOn(AndroidSchedulers.mainThread(), true) instead of .observeOn(AndroidSchedulers.mainThread()
public final Observable<T> observeOn(Scheduler scheduler, boolean delayError) {
return observeOn(scheduler, delayError, RxRingBuffer.SIZE);
}
Above is the signature of observeOn function. Following code works.
Observable.mergeDelayError(
Observable.error(new RuntimeException()),
Observable.just("Hello")
)
.observeOn(AndroidSchedulers.mainThread(), true)
.subscribeOn(Schedulers.io())
.subscribe(new Subscriber<String>() {
#Override
public void onCompleted() {
}
#Override
public void onError(Throwable e) {
}
#Override
public void onNext(String s) {
}
});
Got this trick from ConcatDelayError thread: https://github.com/ReactiveX/RxJava/issues/3908#issuecomment-217999009

This still seems like a bug in the mergeDelayError operator but I was able to get it working by duplicating the observerOn and Subscribe on for each observable.
Observable.mergeDelayError(
Observable.error(new RuntimeException())
.observeOn(AndroidSchedulers.mainThread())
.subscribeOn(Schedulers.io()),
Observable.just("Hello")
.observeOn(AndroidSchedulers.mainThread())
.subscribeOn(Schedulers.io())
)
.finallyDo(completeAction)
.subscribe(successAction, errorAction);

I think you don't wait for the terminal event and the main thread quits before the events are delivered to your observer. The following test passes for me with RxJava 1.0.14:
#Test
public void errorDelayed() {
TestSubscriber<Object> ts = TestSubscriber.create();
Observable.mergeDelayError(
Observable.error(new RuntimeException()),
Observable.just("Hello")
)
.subscribeOn(Schedulers.io()).subscribe(ts);
ts.awaitTerminalEvent();
ts.assertError(RuntimeException.class);
ts.assertValue("Hello");
}

Observable which does not pass anything in onNext()

I would need an Observable, for example to provide a system clock, which does not need to pass anything in onNext(). I couldn't find a signature that would allow me to do that.
Sure, I could use any object and then pass null, but that doesn't make much sense. So my question is if there is a better way to do that.
Observable.create(new Observable.OnSubscribe<Anyobject>() { // use any object in the signature
#Override public void call(Subscriber<? super Anyobject> subscriber) {
subscriber.onNext(null); // then pass null
subscriber.onCompleted();
}
})

You don't need to call onNext if your Observable doesn't emit anything.
You could use Void in your signature and do something like
Observable<Void> o = Observable.create(new Observable.OnSubscribe<Void>() {
#Override
public void call(Subscriber<? super Void> subscriber) {
// Do the work and call onCompleted when you done,
// no need to call onNext if you have nothing to emit
subscriber.onCompleted();
}
});
o.subscribe(new OnCompletedObserver<Void>() {
#Override
public void onCompleted() {
System.out.println("onCompleted");
}
#Override
public void onError(Throwable e) {
System.out.println("onError " + e.getMessage());
}
});
You can define an OnCompletedObserver to simplify your Observer callback so that you don't have to override the onNext since you don't need it.
public abstract class OnCompletedObserver<T> implements Observer<T> {
#Override
public void onNext(T o) {
}
}
If I've understood what you're asking then this should do the trick.

If you need something to be passed to onNext() before onCompleted() is called:
Observable.<Void>just(null)
If you only need onCompleted() to be called:
Observable.empty()

RxJava 2 Wiki:
RxJava 2.x no longer accepts null values and the following will yield
NullPointerException immediately or as a signal to downstream.
...
This means that Observable<Void> can no longer emit any values but
only terminate normally or with an exception. API designers may
instead choose to define Observable<Object> with no guarantee on what
Object will be (which should be irrelevant anyway)
It means that you can't use Void and do Observable.just(null).
Use Object or some other simple type instead:
Observable.just(new Object());

Starting with RxJava 2, the propper way to do this is to use a Completable
From the docs:
Represents a deferred computation without any value but only
indication for completion or exception. The class follows a similar
event pattern as Reactive-Streams: onSubscribe (onError|onComplete)?

One of the light solutions is to use Observable<Boolean>
And then onNext(Boolean.TRUE) which you then just ignore.
But probably you shouldn't use Observable in that case.
Consider using Completable instead

I don't know this will helps you or not.
The code written in RxSwift.
// Create an observable and emit somethings
let myObservable = Observable<Void>.create{ observer in
observer.on(.next(Void()))
return Disposables.create()
}
// Observer subscribe changes
myObservable.subscribe(onNext: {
_ in
print("Hello")
}).disposed(by: disposeBag)
Or use the Variable object
// Create a Variable object that contanins nothing
var myValueWatcher:Variable<Void> = Variable<Void>(Void())
// Observer subscribe changes
myValueWatcher.asObservable().skip(1).subscribe(onNext: {
_ in
print("Changes!")
}).disposed(by: disposeBag)
// The emit code
myValueWatcher.value = Void()