Messaging engine data sources

November 20th, 2006

I’ve had a couple of queries in the past week about whether or not service integration bus messaging engines using a database for the message store need an XA capable JDBC data source. Thanks to Gareth Bottomley in the development team for locating the appropriate section hidden away in the InfoCenter that indicates you should configure a Connection pool data source i.e. non-XA capable. The messaging engine does not use the XA capabilities of the database, instead acting as a resource manager in its own right. So, for example, when you receive a message under a global transaction it is not deleted from the data base at that point under a JDBC transaction. Instead, it is non-transactionally marked with the Xid of the global transaction so that it is not received by other consumers and then, only when the transaction is commited, is the record removed. This is particularly important to note when using Oracle as the database as the Oracle XA driver has notoriously poor performance.

Chawton Forest Park

November 19th, 2006

We went over to the BADO district event at Chawton Forest Park this morning. Yesterday’s sunshine was still with us and it was a pleasure to be out in some of the more runnable bits of the forest. This was probably just as well as I didn’t have the best of runs on the Brown course. My legs felt tired, my cold still hasn’t gone away completely and I have failed to do anything about my ankle since the OMM. On top of this I wasted at least five minutes on just three of the controls.

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Enjoying the sunshine

November 18th, 2006

234We went over to the New Forest this morning to meet up with Christine’s latest orienteering protégé. We had a nice short run from Turf Hill in the glorious sunshine. It was a day for being outside so, after lunch, we went for a walk round the local woods in Knightwood and Valley Park. Some fantastic autumn colours on show although I suspect they won’t last much longer.

Baby pictures

November 17th, 2006

232Had an uneventful journey back from Austria although the M3 was pretty hairy in the torrential rain. Made it home in time to accompany Christine to the Royal Hampshire Hospital in Winchester for her dating scan. The ultrasound produced some very clear pictures. The baby appeared to be resting its head on one arm and it was good to see that it already appears to be practising running! The hospital is currently training its staff to perform nuchal fold testing (already on offer in Southampton and which NICE recommends all hospitals provide by April 2007) and, as a thank you, we got a free selection of pictures to take away.

Performance, adapters and food

November 16th, 2006

Busy day today. Sweated off the remainder of the last night’s alcohol with a morning run. After grabbing a bite to eat (and having another interesting breakfast-time conversation with a colleague) I went to Luc Maquil’s presentation on WebSphere Process Server performance. Luc is one of the authors of the WebSphere Business Integration V6 Performance Tuning Redpaper and consequently knows a thing or two about the subject.

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Sightseeing and SOAP

November 15th, 2006

228I wasn’t due to present until late afternoon today so decided to make the most of the bright sunshine and do a little sightseeing. I repeated my route from Monday morning although this time I had to pay to get in to the Hohensalzburg Fortress. Some of the internal attractions were a bit naff but the audio tour was worth the wait if only to make it out on to the top tower.

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Presentation and dinner

November 14th, 2006

Many of the presentations at the conference are repeats from our internal services conference earlier this year which means I have some spare time to catch up on other work. One session I did go to today was Eric Herness (Chief Architect for WebSphere Business Integration) presenting the new content in Version 6.0.2 of WebSphere Process Service and ESB. I think it’s safe to say this is a refresh pack with more than a few functional enhancements!

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Conference begins

November 13th, 2006

226Went for a run first thing this morning despite the grey skies outside. I crossed the river from the hotel and climbed the hill opposite, following it along to the fortress. The gates were wide open so I just ran on in. There was no-one around and I just continued on up the steep slope to the fortress terrace, snapping photos as I went. Only when I eventually made my way back down to town had someone appeared in the pay booth at the entrance.

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