Closures
The following is not lambda, but a block or closure . It's quite common to see blocks in high order functions acting as #
[1, 2, 3].map { |item| item + 1 }
# => [2, 3, 4]
In the example, Array#map
is a high-order function, and the / block function, passed as a parameter, acts as a first-class function.
Other in JavaScript:
[1, 2, 3].map(function(item) {
return item + 1;
});
// => [2, 3, 4]
Simply put, a closure is a function that can be stored in a variable and can access other local variables in the scope of the variable.
If it were not closures, JavaScript would not work .
Closures vs Lambdas
This is a long discussion of differs and implementation for implementation. A lambda function is an anonymous, unnamed function. In many languages, a lambda is internally converted into a normal function declaration.
Closures have a large difference for lambdas functions as closures are enveloped in their context, thereby giving access to variables in their lexical scope . And that's why closures are also called lexical closures.
Java
Previously I commented that closures and lambdas were in a way on paper, but they vary from implementation to implementation, so ... in Java there are closures , but these are identical to lambdas / em>.
A closure is a lambda expression paired with an environment that binds
each of its free variables to a value. In Java, lambda expressions
will be implemented by means of closures, so the two terms have come
to be used interchangeably in the community. Source.
This means that in lambda expressions lambda are encapsulated in the local scope, as well as closures , conceptually.
Since Java 8, there are lambda expressions . See:
StateOwner stateOwner = new StateOwner();
stateOwner.addStateListener(
(oldState, newState) -> System.out.println("State changed")
);
This is the lambda (which also acts as closure) in Java.
(oldState, newState) -> System.out.println("State changed")
Previous versions of Java
Previous Java versions allowed this to be done, but in a slightly different way and not lambda, as they were not anonymous functions.
StateOwner stateOwner = new StateOwner();
stateOwner.addStateListener(new StateChangeListener() {
public void onStateChange(State oldState, State newState) {
System.out.println("State changed")
}
});
Note that the onStateChange
function has a name and is not a lambda. But it was possible to pass one function as a parameter to another.
Another obstacle was that in Java 7 or lower, to pass a function as a parameter of another, the signature of the method that receives should be an interface, thus respecting the types. In Java 8 you can use Function<TipoRetorno>
.