Configure publish/subscribe for IBM WebSphere MQ Version 6.0 queue managers

In IBM MQ Explorer, we can configure IBM WebSphere MQ Version 6.0 queue managers as brokers to route messages between publishing applications and subscribing applications. To test your configurations, we can register as a publisher and as a subscriber, and send and receive test publications.

Before starting

Before you start:

• Create and configure queue managers and objects. The queue manager will host the publish/subscribe broker.

For more information about brokers and broker networks, see Publish/subscribe messaging.

About this task

To configure publish/subscribe messaging on a Version 6 queue manager:

Procedure

1. Register as a publisher.
2. Register as a subscriber.
3. Send and receive test publications.

What to do next

In IBM MQ Explorer, we can also view and clear retained publications, and view a list of the publishing applications, the subscribing applications, and the streams.

• Topics
  A topic identifies what a publication is about. Topic names are characters strings. Subscriptions can include wildcard characters to retrieve the information required by the application. IBM MQ Publish/Subscribe recognizes the asterisk (*) and the question mark (?) as wildcard characters.
• Publications
  Publications are messages that are sent by an application to the broker. The broker then sends the messages on to any applications that have subscribed to receive the messages.
• Streams
  Streams apply to IBM WebSphere MQ Version 6.0 queue managers only, and provide a way of separating the flow of information for different topics. A stream is implemented as a set of queues, one at each broker that supports the stream. Each queue has the same name (the name of the stream). The default stream set up between all the brokers in a network is called SYSTEM.BROKER.DEFAULT.STREAM.
• Registering as a publisher
  The first time that you publish on a topic, we are implicitly registered with the broker as a publisher. If, however, the broker is not aware of the stream on which you publish, or if we do not know whether the broker is aware of the stream, we must explicitly register as a publisher so that the broker is aware of the stream.
• Registering as a subscriber
  To register your interest in receiving publications, we must register with the broker as a subscriber on the topics in which we are interested.
• View a list of registered publishers
  We can view a list of applications that are registered to publish on topics on a broker, or a list of applications that are registered to publish on a specific topic.
• View a list of subscribers
  We can view a list of applications that are subscribed to topics on a broker, or a list of applications that are subscribed to a specific topic.
• View a list of streams
  Streams provide a way of separating the flow of information for different topics. We can view a list of all the streams that are currently available on the broker.
• View retained publications
  Retained publications are publications that are retained by the broker after sending the publication to interested subscribers (usually, the broker deletes publications after sending them and does not retain copies). We can view the retained publication that is currently kept by the broker. The broker retains only one publication for each topic.
• Clearing retained publications
  Retained publications are publications that are retained by the broker after sending the publication to interested subscribers (usually, the broker deletes publications after sending them and does not retain copies). We can clear the retained publication that is currently kept by the broker. The broker retains only one publication for each topic.
• Send and receiving test publications
  We can send (publish) and receive (subscribe to) test publications (messages) to check that your broker network and topics work as intended. We can configure a publication so that the broker retains a copy after publishing it to the subscribers. This enables new subscribers to receive the publication even if they subscribed after it was published.

Parent topic: Configure publish/subscribe messaging

Related tasks

• View retained publications
• View a list of registered publishers
• View a list of subscribers
• View a list of streams