Contents
- What you’ll learn
- Additional prerequisites
- Getting started
- Creating the consumer in the inventory microservice
- Creating the message producer in the system service
- Running the application
- Testing the inventory application
- Optional: Using IBM MQ as the messaging server
- Great work! You’re done!
- Guide Attribution
Tags
Producing and consuming messages in Java microservices
Prerequisites:
Learn how to produce and consume messages to communicate between Java microservices in a standard way by using the Jakarta Messaging API with the embedded Liberty Messaging Server or an external messaging server, IBM MQ.
What you’ll learn
You’ll learn how to communicate between Java web services when one service is producing a continuous stream of asynchronous messages or events to be consumed by other services, rather than just sending and receiving individual requests for data. You will also learn how to use a messaging server and client to manage the production and consumption of the messages by the services.
In this guide, you will first use the embedded Liberty Messaging Server to manage messages, then you will optionally switch to using an external messaging server to manage the messages, in this case, IBM MQ. You might use an external messaging server if it is critical that none of the messages is lost if there is a system overload or outage; for example during a bank transfer in a banking application.
You will learn how to write your Java application using the Jakarta Messaging API which provides a standard way to produce and consume messages in Java application, regardless of which messaging server your application will ultimately use.
The application in this guide consists of two microservices, system
and inventory
. Every 15 seconds, the system
microservice computes and publishes a message that contains the system’s current CPU and memory load usage. The inventory
microservice subscribes to that information at the /systems
REST endpoint so that it can keep an updated list of all the systems and their current system loads.
You’ll create the system
and inventory
microservices using the Jakarta Messaging API to produce and consume the messages using the embedded Liberty Messaging Server.
You will then, optionally, reconfigure the application, without changing the application’s Java code, to use an external IBM MQ messaging server instead.
Additional prerequisites
To complete the optional Using IBM MQ as the messaging server section in this guide, install Docker if it is not already installed. You will use an IBM MQ container as the external messaging server. For installation instructions, refer to the official Docker documentation.
Make sure to start your Docker daemon before you proceed.
Getting started
The fastest way to work through this guide is to clone the Git repository and use the projects that are provided inside:
git clone https://github.com/openliberty/guide-jms-intro.git
cd guide-jms-intro
The start
directory contains the starting project that you will build upon.
The finish
directory contains the finished project that you will build.
Before you begin, make sure you have all the necessary prerequisites.
Try what you’ll build
The finish
directory in the root of this guide contains the finished application. Give it a try before you proceed.
To try out the application, first go to the finish
directory and run the following Maven goal to build and install the models
module. The models
module contains the SystemLoad
data class for both the system
and inventory
microservices to use.
cd finish mvn -pl models clean install
Start the inventory
microservice by running the following command:
mvn -pl inventory liberty:run
Next, open another command-line session, navigate to the finish
directory, and start the system
microservice by using the following command:
mvn -pl system liberty:run
When you see the following message, your Liberty instances are ready:
The defaultServer server is ready to run a smarter planet.
Visit the http://localhost:9081/health URL to confirm that the inventory
microservice is up and running.
When both the liveness and readiness health checks are up, go to the http://localhost:9081/inventory/systems URL to access the inventory
microservice. You see the systemLoad
property for all the systems:
{
"hostname": <your hostname>,
"systemLoad": 6.037155240703536E-9
}
You can revisit the http://localhost:9081/inventory/systems URL after a while, and you will notice the systemLoad
property for the systems changed.
You can also use curl
command to retrieve the hostname
and systemLoad
information from the /inventory/systems
REST endpoint in another command line session:
curl http://localhost:9081/inventory/systems
After you are finished checking out the application, stop the Liberty instances by pressing CTRL+C
in each command-line session where you ran Liberty. Alternatively, you can run the liberty:stop
goal from the finish
directory in another shell session:
mvn -pl inventory liberty:stop mvn -pl system liberty:stop
Creating the consumer in the inventory microservice
Navigate to the start
directory to begin.
When you run Open Liberty in dev mode, dev mode listens for file changes and automatically recompiles and deploys your updates whenever you save a new change.
Run the following goal to start the inventory
microservice in dev mode:
mvn -pl inventory liberty:dev
When you see the following message, your Liberty instance is ready in dev mode:
************************************************************** * Liberty is running in dev mode.
Dev mode holds your command-line session to listen for file changes. Open another command-line session to continue, or open the project in your editor.
The inventory
microservice records in its inventory the recent system load information that it received from potentially multiple instances of the system
microservice.
Create theInventoryQueueListener
class.inventory/src/main/java/io/openliberty/guides/inventory/InventoryQueueListener.java
InventoryQueueListener.java
The inventory
microservice receives the messages from the system
microservice. Implement the InventoryQueueListener
class with the MessageListener
interface and annotate with to monitor the jms/InventoryQueue
message queue. Implement the onMessage()
method that processes the incoming messages, updates the inventory by using the InventoryManager
bean, and logs the action. Use the SystemLoad.fromJson()
method to convert the JSON message string to the SystemLoad
object.
Next, configure the inventory
microservice with an embedded messaging server and the Messaging Server Client feature.
Replace the inventory'sserver.xml
configuration file.inventory/src/main/liberty/config/server.xml
inventory/server.xml
The messagingServer
feature enables a Liberty runtime to host an embedded messaging server to manage messaging destinations. The messagingClient
feature enables applications to connect to a Liberty messaging server and access the messaging destinations hosted on that server through the Jakarta Messaging API that is enabled by the messaging
feature.
Add the wasJmsEndpoint
element to configure the Liberty runtime to monitor and manage incoming JMS connections from any hosts. Set up the messagingEngine
configuration to ensure that the Liberty runtime can manage incoming message queues more effectively, assigning a reliable and persistent destination for the InventoryQueue
. Configure a jmsConnectionFactory
element to use the InventoryCM
connection manager and set properties for the JMS implementation. Define a jmsQueue
element for the InventoryQueue
message queue with its JNDI name and a jmsActivationSpec
element to configure properties, including the queue listener class name and maximum concurrency.
To learn more about configuration for the jmsQueue
element and jmsConnectionFactory
element, see the JMS Queue and JMS Connection Factory documentation.
Creating the message producer in the system service
Open another command-line session, navigate to the start
directory, and run the following goal to start the system
microservice in dev mode:
mvn -pl system liberty:dev
When you see the following message, your Liberty instance is ready in dev mode:
************************************************************** * Liberty is running in dev mode.
The system
microservice is the producer of the messages that are published to the messaging server as a stream of events. Every 15 seconds, the system
microservice triggers an event that calculates the recent CPU usage for the last minute.
Create theSystemService
class.system/src/main/java/io/openliberty/guides/system/SystemService.java
SystemService.java
The SystemService
class contains the sendSystemLoad()
method that calculates the recent system load, creates a SystemLoad
object, and publishes the object as a message to the jms/InventoryQueue
message queue running in the messaging server by using the send()
method. The @Schedule
annotation on the sendSystemLoad()
method sets the frequency at which the system service publishes the calculation to the event stream, ensuring it runs every 15 seconds.
Next, configure the system
microservice to access the message queue.
Replace the system'sserver.xml
configuration file.system/src/main/liberty/config/server.xml
system/server.xml
The messaging
and messagingClient
features enable the Liberty runtime to provide the required messaging services. Add a connectionManager
element to handle connections for the messaging server running on the inventory
microservice. Define the jmsConnectionFactory
element to use the InventoryCM
connection manager and set up the required remoteServerAddress
properties. Use the jmsQueue
element to define the inventory message queue.
In your dev mode console for the system
microservice, type r
and press enter/return
key to restart the Liberty instance so that Liberty reads the configuration changes. When you see the following message, your Liberty instance is ready in dev mode:
************************************************************** * Liberty is running in dev mode.
Running the application
You started the Open Liberty in dev mode at the beginning of the guide, so all the changes were automatically picked up.
You can find the inventory
microservice at the following URLs:
You can also use curl
command to retrieve the hostname
and systemLoad
information from the /inventory/systems
REST endpoint in another command line session:
curl http://localhost:9081/inventory/systems
Testing the inventory application
While you can test your application manually, you should rely on automated tests because they trigger a failure whenever a code change introduces a defect. Because the application is a RESTful web service application, you can use JUnit and the RESTful web service Client API to write tests. In testing the functionality of the application, the scopes and dependencies are being tested.
Create theInventoryEndpointIT
class.inventory/src/test/java/it/io/openliberty/guides/inventory/InventoryEndpointIT.java
InventoryEndpointIT.java
See the following descriptions of the test cases:
-
testGetSystems()
verifies that the hostname and the system load for each system in the inventory are not empty. -
testGetSystemsWithHost()
verifies that the hostname and system load returned by thesystem
microservice match the ones stored in theinventory
microservice and ensures they are not empty. -
testUnknownHost()
verifies that an unknown host or a host that does not expose their JVM system properties is correctly handled as an error.
Running the tests
Because you started Open Liberty in dev mode, you can run the tests by pressing the enter/return
key from the command-line session where you started dev mode for the inventory
microservice.
If the tests pass, you see a similar output to the following example:
-------------------------------------------------------
T E S T S
-------------------------------------------------------
Running it.io.openliberty.guides.inventory.InventoryEndpointIT
Tests run: 3, Failures: 0, Errors: 0, Skipped: 0, Time elapsed: 0.325 sec - in it.io.openliberty.guides.inventory.InventoryEndpointIT
Results :
Tests run: 3, Failures: 0, Errors: 0, Skipped: 0
When you are done checking out the application, stop the Liberty instances by pressing CTRL+C
in each command-line session where you ran the system
and inventory
microservices.
Optional: Using IBM MQ as the messaging server
The application has been built and tested. In this section, you’ll learn how to configure Liberty to use IBM MQ container as the messaging server instead of the embedded Liberty Messaging Server.
WINDOWS
MAC
LINUX
Start IBM MQ by running the following command on the command-line session:
docker pull icr.io/ibm-messaging/mq:9.4.0.0-r3 docker volume create qm1data docker run ^ --env LICENSE=accept ^ --env MQ_QMGR_NAME=QM1 ^ --volume qm1data:/mnt/mqm ^ --publish 1414:1414 --publish 9443:9443 ^ --detach ^ --env MQ_APP_PASSWORD=passw0rd ^ --env MQ_ADMIN_PASSWORD=passw0rd ^ --rm ^ --platform linux/amd64 ^ --name QM1 ^ icr.io/ibm-messaging/mq:9.4.0.0-r3
If you’re an Intel-based Mac user, start IBM MQ by running the following command on the command-line session:
docker pull icr.io/ibm-messaging/mq:9.4.0.0-r3 docker volume create qm1data docker run \ --env LICENSE=accept \ --env MQ_QMGR_NAME=QM1 \ --volume qm1data:/mnt/mqm \ --publish 1414:1414 --publish 9443:9443 \ --detach \ --env MQ_APP_PASSWORD=passw0rd \ --env MQ_ADMIN_PASSWORD=passw0rd \ --rm \ --platform linux/amd64 \ --name QM1 \ icr.io/ibm-messaging/mq:9.4.0.0-r3
If you’re an ARM-based Mac user, check out the How to build Mac IBM MQ container image blog in the IBM TechXchange Community website for building IBM MQ container image.
Navigate to an empty directory for building the IBM MQ Docker container image and run the following commands:
git clone https://github.com/ibm-messaging/mq-container.git -b 9.4.0.0-r3 cd mq-container make build-devserver COMMAND=docker
After building the container image, you can find the image version:
docker images | grep mq
When the container image is built, you see an image similar to the ibm-mqadvanced-server-dev:9.4.0.0-arm64
. Now, you can start IBM MQ by running the following command on the command-line session:
docker volume create qm1data docker run \ --env LICENSE=accept \ --env MQ_QMGR_NAME=QM1 \ --volume docker:/mnt/mqm \ --publish 1414:1414 --publish 9443:9443 \ --detach \ --env MQ_APP_PASSWORD=passw0rd \ --env MQ_ADMIN_PASSWORD=passw0rd \ --name QM1 ibm-mqadvanced-server-dev:9.4.0.0-arm64
Start IBM MQ by running the following command on the command-line session:
docker pull icr.io/ibm-messaging/mq:9.4.0.0-r3 docker volume create qm1data docker run \ --env LICENSE=accept \ --env MQ_QMGR_NAME=QM1 \ --volume qm1data:/mnt/mqm \ --publish 1414:1414 --publish 9443:9443 \ --detach \ --env MQ_APP_PASSWORD=passw0rd \ --env MQ_ADMIN_PASSWORD=passw0rd \ --rm \ --platform linux/amd64 \ --name QM1 \ icr.io/ibm-messaging/mq:9.4.0.0-r3
When the IBM MQ container is running, you can access the https://localhost:9443/ibmmq/console URL.
Replace thepom.xml
file of the inventory service.inventory/pom.xml
inventory/pom.xml
Add the liberty.var.ibmmq-*
properties for the IBM MQ container. You can change to different values when you deploy the application on a production environment without modifying the Liberty server.xml
configuration file.
Replace theserver.xml
file of the inventory service.inventory/src/main/liberty/config/server.xml
inventory/server.xml
Refine the jmsQueue
and jmsActivationSpec
configurations with the variables for IBM MQ settings. Add the resourceAdapter
element to define the RAR file that provides the IBM MQ classes for Java and JMS. Note that the messagingEngine
and jmsConnectionFactory
configurations are removed from the configuration because they are no longer required.
Replace thepom.xml
file of the system service.system/pom.xml
system/pom.xml
Add the liberty.var.ibmmq-*
properties for the IBM MQ container as you did for the inventory
microservice previously.
Replace theserver.xml
file of the system service.system/src/main/liberty/config/server.xml
system/server.xml
Replace the properties.wasJms
configuration by the properties.wmqjmsra
configuration. All property values are defined in the pom.xml
file that you replaced. Also, modify the jmsQueue
property to set the baseQueueName
value with the ${ibmmq-inventory-queue-name}
variable. Add the resourceAdapter
element like you did for the inventory
microservice.
Start the inventory
microservice by running the following command in dev mode:
mvn -pl inventory liberty:dev
Next, open another command-line session, navigate to the start
directory, and start the system
microservice by using the following command:
mvn -pl system liberty:dev
When you see the following message, your Liberty instances are ready in dev mode:
The defaultServer server is ready to run a smarter planet.
You can access the inventory
microservice by the http://localhost:9081/inventory/systems URL.
In the command shell where inventory
dev mode is running, press enter/return
to run the tests. If the tests pass, you’ll see output that is similar to the following example:
-------------------------------------------------------
T E S T S
-------------------------------------------------------
Running it.io.openliberty.guides.inventory.InventoryEndpointIT
Tests run: 3, Failures: 0, Errors: 0, Skipped: 0, Time elapsed: 0.325 sec - in it.io.openliberty.guides.inventory.InventoryEndpointIT
Results :
Tests run: 3, Failures: 0, Errors: 0, Skipped: 0
After you are finished checking out the application, stop the Liberty instances by pressing CTRL+C
in the command-line sessions where you ran the system
and inventory
microservices.
Run the following commands to stop the running IBM MQ container and clean up the qm1data
volume:
docker stop QM1 docker rm QM1 docker volume remove qm1data
Great work! You’re done!
You just developed a Java cloud-native application that uses Jakarta Messaging to produce and consume messages in Open Liberty.
Guide Attribution
Producing and consuming messages in Java microservices by {guide-author} is licensed under CC BY-ND 4.0
Prerequisites:
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