Message-Oriented Communication

Message-oriented transient communication

• Transport-level sockets
• Message-Passing Interface (MPI)
• Message transfer latency -> milliseconds to seconds

Message-oriented persistent communication

• Message-queuing systems or Message-Oriented Middleware (MOM)
• Provide intermediate-term storage capacity for messages
  • Doesn't require either sender or receiver to be active during message transmission
• Message transfer latency -> seconds to minutes

Message-Queuing Model

• Applications communicate by inserting messages into a series of queues

• Loosely-coupled communication

  • Sender is given guarantee that its message will eventually be inserted in recipient's queue

  • No guarantee on timing, or message will actually be read