Last-Value Queues

Last-Value queues are special queues which discard any messages when a newer message with the same value for a well-defined Last-Value property is put in the queue. In other words, a Last-Value queue only retains the last value.

A typical example for Last-Value queue is for stock prices, where you are only interested by the latest value for a particular stock.

Messages sent to an Last-Value queue without the specified property will be delivered as normal and will never be “replaced”.

Configuration

Last Value Key Configuration

Last-Value queues can be statically configured in broker.xml via the last-value-key

<address name="foo.bar">
   <multicast>
      <queue name="orders1" last-value-key="reuters_code" />
   </multicast>
</address>

Specified on creating a queue by using the CORE api specifying the parameter lastValue to true.

Or on auto-create when using the JMS Client by using address parameters when creating the destination used by the consumer.

Queue queue = session.createQueue("my.destination.name?last-value-key=reuters_code");
Topic topic = session.createTopic("my.destination.name?last-value-key=reuters_code");

Address wildcards can be used to configure Last-Value queues for a set of addresses (see here).

<address-setting match="lastValueQueue">
   <default-last-value-key>reuters_code</default-last-value-key>
</address-setting>

By default, default-last-value-key is null.

Legacy Last Value Configuration

Last-Value queues can also just be configured via the last-value boolean property, doing so it will default the last-value-key to "_AMQ_LVQ_NAME".

<address name="foo.bar">
   <multicast>
      <queue name="orders1" last-value="true" />
   </multicast>
</address>

Specified on creating a queue by using the CORE api specifying the parameter lastValue to true.

Or on auto-create when using the JMS Client by using address parameters when creating the destination used by the consumer.

Queue queue = session.createQueue("my.destination.name?last-value=true");
Topic topic = session.createTopic("my.destination.name?last-value=true");

Also the default for all queues under and address can be defaulted using the address-setting configuration:

<address-setting match="lastValueQueue">
   <default-last-value-queue>true</default-last-value-queue>
</address-setting>

By default, default-last-value-queue is false.

Note that address-setting last-value-queue config is deprecated, please use default-last-value-queue instead.

Last-Value Property

The property name used to identify the last value is configurable at the queue level mentioned above.

If using the legacy setting to configure an LVQ then the default property "_AMQ_LVQ_NAME" is used (or the constant Message.HDR_LAST_VALUE_NAME from the Core API).

For example, using the sample configuration

<address name="foo.bar">
   <multicast>
      <queue name="orders1" last-value-key="reuters_code" />
   </multicast>
</address>

if two messages with the same value for the Last-Value property are sent to a Last-Value queue, only the latest message will be kept in the queue:

// send 1st message with Last-Value property `reuters_code` set to `VOD`
TextMessage message = session.createTextMessage("1st message with Last-Value property set");
message.setStringProperty("reuters_code", "VOD");
producer.send(message);
// send 2nd message with Last-Value property `reuters_code` set to `VOD`
message = session.createTextMessage("2nd message with Last-Value property set");
message.setStringProperty("reuters_code", "VOD");
producer.send(message);
...
// only the 2nd message will be received: it is the latest with
// the Last-Value property set
TextMessage messageReceived = (TextMessage)messageConsumer.receive(5000);
System.out.format("Received message: %s\n", messageReceived.getText());

Forcing all consumers to be non-destructive

When a consumer attaches to a queue, the normal behaviour is that messages are sent to that consumer are acquired exclusively by that consumer, and when the consumer acknowledges them, the messages are removed from the queue.

Another common pattern is to have queue “browsers” which send all messages to the browser, but do not prevent other consumers from receiving the messages, and do not remove them from the queue when the browser is done with them. Such a browser is an instance of a “non-destructive” consumer.

If every consumer on a queue is non destructive then we can obtain some interesting behaviours. In the case of a LVQ then the queue will always contain the most up to date value for every key.

A queue can be created to enforce all consumers are non-destructive for last value queue. This can be achieved using the following queue configuration:

<address name="foo.bar">
   <multicast>
      <queue name="orders1" last-value-key="reuters_code" non-destructive="true" />
   </multicast>
</address>

Or on auto-create when using the JMS Client by using address parameters when creating the destination used by the consumer.

Queue queue = session.createQueue("my.destination.name?last-value-key=reuters_code&non-destructive=true");
Topic topic = session.createTopic("my.destination.name?last-value-key=reuters_code&non-destructive=true");

Also the default for all queues under and address can be defaulted using the address-setting configuration:

<address-setting match="lastValueQueue">
   <default-last-value-key>reuters_code</default-last-value-key>
   <default-non-destructive>true</default-non-destructive>
</address-setting>

By default, default-non-destructive is false.

Bounding size using expiry-delay

For queues other than LVQs, having only non-destructive consumers could mean that messages would never get deleted, leaving the queue to grow unconstrainedly. To prevent this you can use the ability to set a default expiry-delay.

See expiry-delay for more details on this.

Example

See the last-value queue example which shows how last value queues are configured and used with JMS.