Queues in Windows Communication Foundation

The topics in this section discuss Windows Communication Foundation (WCF) support for queues. WCF provides support for queuing by leveraging Microsoft Message Queuing (previously known as MSMQ) as a transport and enables the following scenarios:

• Loosely coupled applications. Sending applications can send messages to queues without needing to know whether the receiving application is available to process the message. The queue provides processing independence that allows a sending application to send messages to the queue at a rate that does not depend on how fast the receiving applications can process the messages. Overall system availability increases when sending messages to a queue is not tightly coupled to message processing.

• Failure isolation. Applications sending or receiving messages to a queue can fail without affecting each other. If, for example, the receiving application fails, the sending application can continue to send messages to the queue. When the receiver is up again, it can process the messages from the queue. Failure isolation increases the overall system reliability and availability.

• Load leveling. Sending applications can overwhelm receiving applications with messages. Queues can manage mismatched message production and consumption rates so that a receiver is not overwhelmed.

• Disconnected operations. Sending, receiving, and processing operations can become disconnected when communicating over high-latency networks or limited-availability networks, such as in the case of mobile devices. Queues allow these operations to continue, even when the endpoints are disconnected. When the connection is reestablished, the queue forwards messages to the receiving application.

To use the queues feature in a WCF application, you can use one of the standard bindings, or you can create a custom binding if one of the standard bindings does not satisfy your requirements. For more information about relevant standard bindings and how to choose one, see How to: Exchange Messages with WCF Endpoints and Message Queuing Applications. For more information about creating custom bindings, see Custom Bindings.

In This Section

• Queues Overview
  An overview of message queuing concepts.

• Queuing in WCF
  An overview of WCF queue support.

• How to: Exchange Queued Messages with WCF Endpoints
  Explains how to use the NetMsmqBinding class to communicate between a WCF client and WCF service.

• How to: Exchange Messages with WCF Endpoints and Message Queuing Applications
  Explains how to use the MsmqIntegrationBinding to communicate between WCF and Message Queuing applications.

• Grouping Queued Messages in a Session
  Explains how to group messages in a queue to facilitate correlated message processing by a single receiving application.

• Batching Messages in a Transaction
  Explains how to batch messages in a transaction.

• Using Dead-Letter Queues to Handle Message Transfer Failures
  Explains how to handle message transfer and delivery failures using dead letter queues and how to process messages from the dead letter queue.

• Poison Message Handling
  Explains how to handle poison messages (messages that have exceeded the maximum number of delivery attempts to the receiving application).

• Differences in Queuing Features in Windows Vista, Windows Server 2003, and Windows XP
  Summarizes the differences in the WCF queues feature between Windows Vista, Windows Server 2003, and Windows XP.

• Securing Messages Using Transport Security
  Describes how to use transport security to secure queued messages.

• Securing Messages Using Message Security
  Describes how to use message security to secure queued messages.

• Troubleshooting Queued Messaging
  Explains how to troubleshoot common queuing problems.

• Best Practices for Queued Communication
  Explains best practices for using WCF queued communication.

See Also

Other Resources

Message Queuing

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Build Date: 2009-08-07