How to configure initial-context-factory and provider_url on Websphere MQ

Question

I have a few questions about WebSphere MQ. Currently, my application is able work well with other JMS provider. But I would like to move to use WebSphere instead.
Can anyone suggest me how to configure the application connecting WebSphere?
�     I�m using the Initial java naming factory as bellows: com.sun.jndi.fscontext.RefFSContextFactoryIs it the correct class?
�     About the java-naming-factory-url, How do I know what object that I should use? I found this example in JMSAdmin.config � iiop://localhost:7555� What�s iiop ?
�     What jar file that I should add in my classpath?

Answer 1

Hi,
You have a few options...
1. Use WebSphere Application Server as the JNDI provider
2. Don't use JNDI
3. Use the File System Context as the JNDI provider
Exploring these options in a bit more detail...
1. Use WebSphere Application Server as the JNDI provider
Assuming you have WAS, the best way of obtaining your queue is to define the Queue and Queue Connection Factory objects in WAS using the admin console, then obtain them from the Initial Context as per the following article
http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/wasinfo/v6r0/index.jsp?topic=/com.ibm.websphere.express.doc/info/exp/ae/rnam_example_prop2.html
If you prefer not to do JNDI lookups in your code a great alternative is to use Spring (www.springframework.org). If you haven't come across spring before it's well worth a look. One of it's many features is a bean factory for creating your objects. There is lots of support for retrieving JMS objects from JNDI, so in the main all you have to do is write some XML similar to the following...
<bean id="jndiTemplate" class="org.springframework.jndi.JndiTemplate">
       <property name="environment">
              <props>
                     <prop key="java.naming.factory.initial">${jndi.initialContextFactory}</prop>
                     <prop key="java.naming.provider.url">${jndi.providerUrl}</prop>
              </props>
       </property>
</bean>
<bean id="queueConnectionFactory" class="org.springframework.jndi.JndiObjectFactoryBean">
       <property name="jndiTemplate" ref="jndiTemplate"/>
       <property name="jndiName" value="${jndi.queueConnectionFactory}"/>
</bean>
<bean id="queueName" class="org.springframework.jndi.JndiObjectFactoryBean">
       <property name="jndiTemplate" ref="jndiTemplate"/>
       <property name="jndiName" value="${jndi.queueName}"/>
</bean>There's a bit more to it than this, but not much. I've been meaning to write a tutorial on this for a while so if you're interested let me know.
2. Don't use JNDI
This approach involves using the creating the native MQ Queue Connection Factory and Queue classes. You can hard code this, but it's much better to abstract it from your application. Again you can use Spring. The definition would look something like the following...
<bean id="MQJMS_TP_CLIENT_MQ_TCPIP"
class="org.springframework.beans.factory.config.FieldRetrievingFactoryBean">
       <property name="staticField">
              <value>com.ibm.mq.jms.JMSC.MQJMS_TP_CLIENT_MQ_TCPIP</value>
       </property>
</bean>
<bean id="queueConnectionFactory" class="com.ibm.mq.jms.MQQueueConnectionFactory">
       <property name="transportType" ref="MQJMS_TP_CLIENT_MQ_TCPIP" />
       <property name="queueManager" value="${mq.queueManager}" />
       <property name="hostName" value="${mq.host}" />
       <property name="port" value="${mq.port}" />
       <property name="channel" value="${mq.channel}" />
</bean>
<bean id="publishInvoiceQ" class="com.ibm.mq.jms.MQQueue">
       <constructor-arg value="${mq.queueName}" />
</bean>
3. Use the File System Context
The file system context is just like a JNDI context, but instead of using a url like iiop://host:port you have to specify a file system url. Because FSContext is just another JNDI context you can still use the spring configuration from option 1, but just change the relevant parameters.
In order to define you queues and queue connection factory using the File System Context, you need to download a swing application called JMS Admin. Get it here
http://www-1.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?rs=171&uid=swg24004691&loc=en_US&cs=utf-8&lang=en
With regards your specific questions...
IIOP is just another communication protocol. If you want more details I'm sure typing "what is iiop" into google will provide plenty of hits.
I'll do my best to answer the remain two tomorrow - I wrote an application a few months ago which used the File System Context, but don't have the details to hand.