这是关于下载网页的:

Your program runs on a cellphone and is requesting the webpage http://www.google.com. If you write your program synchronously, the function you write to download the data will be running continuously until all the data is download. This means your UI will not refresh and will basically appear frozen. If you write your program using callbacks, you request the data and say "execute this function when you've finished." This allows the UI to still allow user interaction while the file is downloading. Once the webpage has finished downloading, your result function (callback) is called and you can handle the data.

基本上，它允许你请求一些东西，并在等待结果的同时继续执行。一旦结果通过回调函数返回给您，您就可以从它停止的地方开始操作。

为了教授回调，你必须先教授指针。一旦学生理解了指向变量的指针的概念，回调的概念就会变得更容易。假设您使用的是C/ c++，可以遵循这些步骤。

First show your students how to use and manipulate variables using pointers alongside using the normal variable identifiers. Then teach them there are things that can be done only with pointers(like passing a variable by reference). Then tell them how executable code or functions are just like some other data(or variables) in the memory. So, functions also have addresses or pointers. Then show them how functions can be called with function pointers and tell these are called callbacks. Now, the question is, why all these hassle for calling some functions? What is the benefit? Like data pointers, function pointer aka callbacks has some advantages over using normal identifiers. The first one is, function identifiers or function names cannot be used as normal data. I mean, you cannot make a data structure with functions(like an array or a linked list of functions). But with callbacks, you can make an array, a linked list or use them with other data like in dictionary of key-value pairs or trees, or any other things. This is a powerful benefit. And other benefits are actually child of this one. The most common use of callbacks is seen in event driver programming. Where one or more functions are executed based on some incoming signal. With callbacks, a dictionary can be maintained to map signals with callbacks. Then the input signal resolution and execution of corresponding code become much easier. The second use of callbacks coming in my mind is higher order functions. The functions which takes other functions as input arguments. And to send functions as arguments, we need callbacks. An example can be a function which take an array and a callback. Then it performs the callback on each of the item of the array and return the results in another array. If we pass the function a doubling callback, we get a doubled valued array. If we pass a squaring callback, we get squares. For square roots, just send appropriate callback. This cannot be done with normal functions.

可能还有更多的事情。让学生参与进来，他们就会发现。希望这能有所帮助。

这里有两点需要解释，一个是回调是如何工作的(传递一个可以在不了解上下文的情况下调用的函数)，另一个是它的用途(异步处理事件)。

用其他答案用过的等待包裹到达的比喻来解释这两个问题是很好的。在计算机程序中，你会告诉计算机期待一个包裹。通常情况下，它现在会坐在那里等待(什么也不做)，直到包裹到达，如果包裹从未到达，它可能会无限期地等待。对人类来说，这听起来很愚蠢，但如果没有进一步的措施，这对计算机来说是完全自然的。

现在回调是你前门的铃声。你为包裹服务提供了一种通知你包裹到达的方式，而不需要他们知道你在房子的哪里(即使)，或者铃声是如何工作的。(例如，一些“铃声”实际上是发送一个电话。)因为你提供了一个“回调函数”，可以在任何时候被“调用”，脱离上下文，你现在可以不用坐在门廊前，随时“处理事件”(包裹到达)。

程序员Johny需要一个订书机，所以他去办公用品部门要了一个，填写完申请表后，他可以站在那里等着店员去仓库里找订书机(就像一个阻塞函数调用)，或者去做其他的事情。

由于这通常需要时间，johny在申请表格上写了一张便条，要求他们在订书机准备好取书时给他打电话，这样他就可以去做其他事情，比如在办公桌上打盹。

当我们有两个函数，函数a和函数b，如果函数a依赖于函数b。

然后我们调用函数b作为回调函数。这在Spring框架中被广泛使用。

回调允许您将自己的代码插入到另一个代码块中，以便在另一个时间执行，从而修改或添加其他代码块的行为以满足您的需要。您获得了灵活性和可定制性，同时能够拥有更可维护的代码。

更少的硬代码=更容易维护和更改=更少的时间=更多的业务价值=很棒。

例如，在javascript中，使用Underscore.js，你可以在这样的数组中找到所有偶数元素:

var evens = _.filter([1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6], function(num){ return num % 2 == 0; });
=> [2, 4, 6]

示例由Underscore.js提供:http://documentcloud.github.com/underscore/#filter