First and Last

.first (Publishers.First) emits the first value received from upstream. Just before emitting its value, it cancels the upstream publisher; after emitting its value, it emits a .finished completion.

.first(where:) (Publishers.FirstWhere) takes a function that receives a value from upstream and returns a Bool. As soon as the function returns true for some upstream value, this operator cancels the upstream publisher and emits that upstream value, followed by a .finished completion.

.tryFirst(where:) (Publishers.TryFirstWhere) is like .first(where:) except that the function can throw. If it does, it cancels the upstream and that error is passed downstream as a failure.

.last (Publishers.Last) emits the last value received from upstream, followed by a .finished completion. Obviously it doesn’t know that it has received the last value until it receives a .finished completion from upstream, so this operator is also an accumulator, maintaining the most recently received value until the time comes to emit it.

.last(where:) (Publishers.LastWhere) takes a function that receives a value from upstream and returns a Bool. It emits the last value received from upstream for which the function returned true, followed by a .finished completion. Obviously it doesn’t know that it has received the last value until it receives a .finished completion from upstream, so this operator is also an accumulator, maintaining the most recently received value for which the function returned true until the time comes to emit it.

.tryLast(where:) (Publishers.TryLastWhere) is like .last(where:) except that the function can throw. If it does, it cancels the upstream and that error is passed downstream as a failure.