Design Patterns

You are probably already programming in scala although you may not be an expert. If you come from a OOP background it can take a long time, years in some cases, to become fluent in functional programming. Generally, using more functional programming approaches and designs in your projects is a good idea. Scalaz, the base library, assumes a functional programming model and leverages the vocabulary of category theory, a computer science and mathematical discipline. Scalaz-stream uses the language of "processes" to describe its components and uses scalaz underneath.

You do not need to be a disciple of category theory to use sstream but it is useful to understand category theory. Category theory vocabulary ideas are succinct and re-usable across many programming concerns. In other words, a little category theory goes a long way to helping improve the programs you write.