Friday, October 15, 2010

Websphere Message Broker v7 – What’s new ?

As per the IBM documentation, they say the following 4 are the main themes of Websphere message broker v7 new features.
  • Simplicity and productivity
  • Universal connectivity for SOA
  • Dynamic operational management
  • Platforms, environments, and performance

    Simplicity and productivity

    Websphere Message Broker v7 (will be referred as WMB7 in this blog) has very few components compared to v6x. fewer interacting components means fewer opportunities for failure. WMB7 has only one component, that is Broker. Broker database, Config Mgr, User Name Server are no longer required
    Tools now connect directly to the broker, and do not use a configuration manager. This change reduces the number of steps required for administrative tasks. and gives the tools direct access to more configuration information.
    mqsilist command can now work with remote brokers.
    You can enable administrative security directly on the broker, which lets you decide who can read, write, and execute on specific brokers and execution groups.
    Brokers create and manage configuration data and deployed resources in an internal repository in the local file system
    Commands have been added to back up and restore broker configuration for the purposes of disaster recovery. mqsi[backup|restore]broker
    Publish/subscribe
    Message Broker V7 uses WebSphere MQ V7.0.1 to handle publish/subscribe (pub/sub) requests, which means that there is a single topic space and configuration for both products.
    WebSphere MQ now handles all topic based publish / subscribe support. Applications use a single topic space that is managed by WebSphere MQ. Access control is handled by the queue manager. Broker Domains no longer exist. Default execution groups, which previous versions of Message Broker required in order to run the pub/sub engine, are no longer used.
    Message Broker Toolkit
    A new Brokers view lets you administer local and remote brokers without using separate tools.
    Integrated into the Application Development perspective, the Brokers view gives you quick access to basic administration tasks while you are developing and testing Message Broker solutions. For example, you can deploy message flows directly onto execution groups without having to build BAR files or change perspectives, and deployment results are displayed synchronously in a new Deployment log, which lets you quickly ensure that message flows are deployed and working as expected.
    The Message Broker Toolkit now also includes an Impact Analysis tool, which enables you to discover interdependencies between Message Broker artifacts, such as when renaming an ESQL module.
    Message Broker Explorer
    The Message Broker Explorer is a new tool to facilitate the administration of broker environments.
    As a plug-in to the WebSphere MQ V7.0.1 Explorer, it gives you a single, consistent management console for both queue managers and brokers. Message Broker Explorer also gives you tools to easily modify and tune your brokers.
    The administrator can also view real-time performance information, including both message flow performance (such as throughput rates), and the performance of the broker’s resources (such as the JVM).
    Patterns Explorer
    The WMB7 Toolkit contains a Patterns Explorer, which lets you browse available patterns for ones that might be applicable to the current problem

    Universal connectivity for SOA

    Websphere Process Server Support:
    WMB7 makes it easier for application connectivity logic to interact with WebSphere Process Server using 5 newly introduced nodes. SCA Nodes – Provide improved interaction between WMB and WPS v6.2 using SOAP/HTTP or MQ Bindings.
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    PHP Support:
    PHP Scripting support to allow message transformation and routing. PHP Compute Node, a programmable node that can be used that to transform and route messages using PHP scripts.
    EIS Connectivity Enhancements
    The SAP, Siebel, and PeopleSoft nodes that were added in V6.1 enable these Enterprise Information Systems to easily interact with the rest of the enterprise. Message Broker V7 improves these nodes by making them easier to manage operationally.
    • New SAPReply node to send a reply to an SAP synchronous callout (SAP)
    • Generic IDoc Routing (SAP)
    • SCI support with SAP Reply node (SAP)
    • Eases promotion of SEBL and PSOFT message flows through Test, QA, Production lifecycle
    • New configurable service provides reconfiguration of key adapter node properties (Siebel/Peoplesoft)
    • Iterative Deployment’ to easily add new definitions to existing deployments (Siebel/Peoplesoft)
    Sequence & Re-sequence Nodes
    These new nodes in WMB7 help ensure the correct processing of messages in scenarios where ordering is critical.
    The Sequence node causes the broker to apply a sequence number to messages. The Resequence node lets messages arrive in any order, but will only propagate messages in the correct order

    Dynamic operational management

    Audit and monitoring
    Using the Message Broker Toolkit, or operationally from the command line, you can now specify when you want events to occur and the content of those events, which can then be used to satisfy these scenarios. Events are published on a well-known pub/sub topic using in a simple format that uses a published schema. A message-driven bean (MDB) sample is provided that subscribes to these events and makes them available to an instance of WebSphere Business Monitor.
    • Easily gain insight into application and service connectivity
    • ‘Monitor’ tab on every MB node to generate events
    • Configure payload data, content style, identity, correlation & sequencing data
    • Operationally enable, disable, change event production: mqsichangeflowmonitoring command
    Resource Statistics
    WMB7 introduces a new framework for reporting resource utilization in the broker. This framework helps you immediately understand broker behavior, and can be used for problem diagnosis and in optimizing broker environments.
    • Allows operational personnel to understand behavior of deployed solutions
    • Reports comprehensive usage according of well known resources
    • Graphically reported through MB Explorer
    Multi-instance brokers
    WMB V7 utilizes the multi-instance queue manager support introduced in WMQ V7 to provide a HA configuration with Active / Passive Brokers. Multi-instance brokers and QMGRs store their configurations on shared network storage.
    The feature works with WebSphere MQ in one of two ways. Each broker instance can be started as an MQ service, so that when the queue manager fails over to the standby, the broker is automatically started. Alternatively, the standby broker can be continually running in a semi-initialized state, waiting for the associated standby queue manager and shared broker configuration to become available.

    Platforms, environments, and performance

    • WMB7 broker is now exclusively 64-bit on all platforms, with the exception of the Windows and Linux on x86 hardware, which remains 32-bit
    • Message Broker V7 requires WebSphere MQ V7.0.1, in order to take advantage of features such as pub/sub, the MQ Explorer, and multi-instance queue managers
    • the broker uses a Java 6 JVM. In many scenarios, the 64-bit IBM J9 engine offers improved Java performance, including reductions in start-up time and memory footprint.
    Migration
    • Direct migration to Message Broker V7 is supported from Message Broker V6.0 and V6.1. V7 coexists with previous versions, which means that V7 will run alongside and independently of your existing version, thus eliminating the need for additional hardware while migrating.
    • Existing message flows and related files can be imported into and used by a Message Broker V7 Toolkit workspace
    • You can migrate brokers using the mqsimigratecomponents command, which moves an existing local broker to V7, while retaining its deployed configuration.
    • Once a broker has been migrated to V7, the V7 tools can manage it directly.