Materials and resources about Flow Based Programming (FBP)
Wikipedia
In computer programming, flow-based programming (FBP) is a programming paradigm that defines applications as networks of "black box" processes, which exchange data across predefined connections by message passing, where the connections are specified externally to the processes. These black box processes can be reconnected endlessly to form different applications without having to be changed internally. FBP is thus naturally component-oriented.
FBP is a particular form of dataflow programming based on bounded buffers, information packets with defined lifetimes, named ports, and separate definition of connections.
In classical FBP, the data is a first class citizen. As opposed to constructing an application around the notion that it is a single, sequential process which starts at one point in time and then does a set sequence of things until it is "finished", FBP is a network of asynchronous processes that communicate by passing data streams or information packets around.
J Paul Morrison, a long time employee of IBM, is credited with being the discoverer of the flow-base programming paradigm and has been advocating for and promoting this idea for some 40 years now. He and other advocates make a distinction between classical FBP and FBP inspired or influenced paradigms such as NoFlo or Node-RED.
The notion of data as being an object that has a definite lifetime, and that must be cared for as a first class object, comes from the days of old Unit Record Machines, or punchcard machines. Morrison speaks of being unnerved at the side effects of Van Neumann architecture, where data could simply "disappear", or be taken care of by some unseen, underlying garbage collection mechanism.