Console.ReadLine() passed to C# event - events

Question

I'm learning RX and would like to use Console.ReadLine as a source for observable sequences.
I know that I can create "IEnumerable" using "yield return", but for my concrete use case I've decided to create a C# event, so that potentially many observers will be able to share the same keyboard input.
Here is my code:
class Program
{
private delegate void OnNewInputLineHandler(string line);
private static event OnNewInputLineHandler OnNewInputLineEvent = _ => {};
static void Main(string[] args)
{
Task.Run((Action) GetInput);
var input = ConsoleInput();
input.Subscribe(s=>Console.WriteLine("1: " + s));
Thread.Sleep(30000);
}
private static void GetInput()
{
while (true)
OnNewInputLineEvent(Console.ReadLine());
}
private static IObservable<string> ConsoleInput()
{
return Observable.Create<string>(
(IObserver<string> observer) =>
{
OnNewInputLineHandler h = observer.OnNext;
OnNewInputLineEvent += h;
return Disposable.Create(() => { OnNewInputLineEvent -= h; });
});
}
}
My problem - when I run the GetInput method as it is shown above, the very first input line is not sent to the sequence (but it is sent to the event handler).
However, if I replace it with the following version, everything works as expected:
private static void GetInput()
{
while (true)
{
var s = Console.ReadLine();
OnNewInputLineEvent(s);
}
}
Could someone shed some light on why this might happen?

Answer 1

You're trying to make life difficult for yourself. There is almost always a way to make things simple with Rx. It's just a matter of learning to think more functionally rather than procedurally.
This is all you need:
class Program
{
static void Main(string[] args)
{
var subscription = ConsoleInput().Subscribe(s => Console.WriteLine("1: " + s));
Thread.Sleep(30000);
subscription.Dispose();
}
private static IObservable<string> ConsoleInput()
{
return
Observable
.FromAsync(() => Console.In.ReadLineAsync())
.Repeat()
.Publish()
.RefCount()
.SubscribeOn(Scheduler.Default);
}
}
This lets multiple subscribers share the one input through the .Publish().RefCount(). And the .SubscribeOn(Scheduler.Default) pushes the subscription out to a new thread - without it you block on a subscription.

Answer 2

If you move Task.Run((Action) GetInput); to after the subscription your code will work as desired. This is because in your original version, the first call of OnNewInputEvent(Console.ReadLine()) is run before you've hooked OnNewInputLineEvent to the observer.OnNext.