- Extended platform support
- The Configuration Manager is supported
on all the broker platforms including z/OS®, Linux®, UNIX®, and Windows®; see Configuration Manager.
The Message Brokers Toolkit can be installed on Linux on
x86 in addition to Windows; see Message Brokers Toolkit.
Database support on Linux on
x86 is extended to include
Oracle in addition to DB2®; see Supported databases.
- Simplified installation and migration
The installation of WebSphere Message
Broker Version 6.0 is
easier than that of WebSphere Business
Integration Message Broker Version 5.0 because
the number of prerequisite products has been reduced. For more information
on installation, see the Installation Guide.
The Configuration Manager no longer requires a
database.
A Default Configuration wizard
is provided to quickly build a full environment for development or
other simple configurations on Windows and Linux on
x86. For more information
on the Default Configuration wizard, see Using the Default Configuration wizard, and the Installation Guide.
Migration from WebSphere MQ Integrator Version 2.1 and WebSphere Business
Integration Message Broker Version 5.0 are supported. Both Version 2.1 and Version 5.0 can coexist with WebSphere Message
Broker Version 6.0, allowing a phased migration.
In addition, the command mqsimigratecomponents is
provided to migrate individual components from one codebase to another.
For more information on migration, see Migrating and upgrading.
The
installation of
WebSphere Message
Broker for
z/OS Version 6.0 has been simplified in the following
ways:
- A single command can be used to create the broker, Configuration Manager, and User Name Server components.
- All commands are JCL-based, meaning that no UNIX shell is required.
For more information, see the
Installation Guide.
- Improved Message Brokers Toolkit
- The Message Brokers Toolkit is based on
the latest release of Rational® Application Developer,
powered by the Eclipse open source platform. The Message Brokers Toolkit includes the following new
features:
- Support on Linux on
x86 in
addition to Windows.
- XML editors.
- Visual debugging with the following resources, which
reduces the need for Eclipse perspective switching:
- Message
flows
- ESQL
- Java™
- Graphical mappings
For more information, see Flow debugger overview.
For more information about the Message Brokers Toolkit, see Message Brokers Toolkit.
- Flexible transformation
- Enhanced graphical mapping
- The mapping tools support both novice and expert users, when authoring
unidirectional transformations between source and target instance
data elements. In addition to requiring less ESQL coding, the tools
include the following enhancements:
- A Message Mapping
editor with
a source pane, target pane, drag and drop, spreadsheet view, expression
entry field, edit window, and marker bar with breakpoint indication
for debug purposes; see Message Mapping editor.
- An incremental
builder that
validates map content and external links, and generates ESQL object
code as output for deployment to the broker.
- Support for user-defined functions written in Java and
ESQL.
- The ability to split source messages into a number of output messages,
convert the message type automatically, map message headers, and map
repeating elements.
Compatibility with earlier versions is provided by automatic
migration, where existing mfmap files are rewritten in the new msgmap
format. Message
flows with Mapping nodes continue to function
without change.
For more information about mapping, see Message mappings overview.
- Routing and transformation rules in Java
- You can use the JavaCompute node to write routing
and transformation logic in Java. A
standard J2SE 1.4.2 environment is provided with the standard Eclipse Java editor with color highlighting and code
assist to create the transformations. XPath helper methods are provided,
in addition to the full plug-in methods, to give easy access to message
fields. No ESQL skill or experience is required.
You can deploy Java jars to the broker using the standard deployment
facilities.
For more information about the JavaCompute node, see JavaCompute node.
- ESQL enhancements
- Transforming and routing messages using ESQL has been made easier
by the following enhancements:
- In-memory cache to reduce access to databases for read-only routing
or validation data.
- Improved support for creating DATETIME variables.
- Access to multiple databases from the same Compute, JavaCompute, Database, or Filter node.
- Dynamic database schemas.
- New-user defined properties that can pass parameters to ESQL
to modify standard behavior.
- Access to environment information; for example, message flow name and broker name.
- Improved support for result sets returned by database stored
procedures.
- Improved error recovery using SQL handlers.
- Multiple out terminals to combine the function of Compute and Filter nodes.
For more information, see ESQL overview.
- XSLT enhancements
- Performance of XSLT transformations is improved by the support
of compiled style sheets. The style sheets can also be deployed using
the standard deployment facilities.
For more information on XSLT
transformations, see XMLTransformation node.
- Improved performance and scalability
- Performance of the broker run time has been significantly improved
by the following enhancements:
- The path lengths of the major broker functions have been shortened.
- The cost of parsing and streaming messages has been reduced.
- ESQL and publish/subscribe functions have been improved.
- The aggregation nodes now use WebSphere MQ queues to store state information
instead of a database. This improves the throughput of all requests,
with the greatest improvement being gained with non-persistent requests.
- A new in-memory cache allows more efficient message flows to be developed.
- The storage requirements of the MRM and XML parsers
have been reduced so that larger messages can be processed.
- Coexistence
- WebSphere Message
Broker Version 6.0 can coexist with either a Version 2.1 or a Version 5.0 product on the same computer.
You can install WebSphere Message
Broker Version 6.0 in a different location on the
same computer, migrate your components and resources to WebSphere Message
Broker Version 6.0, and uninstall the Version 2.1 or Version 5.0 product later when you are sure
that you no longer need it.
- With some restrictions, all Version 5.0 components
can participate in a Version 6.0 broker
domain, and all Version 6.0 components
can participate in a Version 5.0 broker
domain. A Version 2.1 broker is the
only Version 2.1 component that can
take part in a Version 6.0 broker domain.
For
more information about coexistence, see Coexistence with previous versions and other products.
- Enhanced support for Web services
- Web services support has been extended in the following ways:
- SOAP 1.2 is supported.
- HTTP 1.1 is supported.
- SOAP schemas are provided; using SOAP schemas can help simplify
the modeling and transformation of SOAP messages; see SOAP.
- WSDL definitions can be imported using the new WSDL importer;
see Importing from WSDL files to create message definitions.
- The WSDL generator has been improved; see Generating a WSDL definition from a message set.
- Imported and generated WSDL is validated for compliance with the
Web Services Interoperability (WS-I) Basic Profile 1.0.
- The HTTP transport has been extended to provide HTTPS support,
which provides added privacy and security.
- Driving message flows
- Message
flows can be driven by
JMS transports. Supported JMS providers include the embedded JMS provider
in WebSphere Application Server Version 6.0; see WebSphere Broker JMS Transport.
New TimeoutControl and TimeoutNotification nodes allow message flows to be driven periodically
rather than by an external event; see TimeoutControl node and TimeoutNotification node.
A new MQGet node allows messages
to be retrieved midway through a message flow,
not only at the beginning of the message flow.
Groups of messages can be dealt with together, and queues can be used
to save temporary state information; see MQGet node.
- Enhanced message parsing
- The performance of both parsing and writing messages has been
significantly improved to allow greater throughput, especially of
large messages.
A new WSDL importer is provided to create message
models from WSDL files, simplifying the integration of Web Services.
A
new MIME parser is provided to allow the parsing of multipart MIME
messages such as SOAP with Attachments and RosettaNet; see MIME parser and domain.
Message models for industry standard
message definitions, such as SOAP envelope, MIME headers, and SAP
IDoc segments, are supplied for inclusion in your own message sets.
Support
has been added for XML Schema list and union simple types, xsi:type
attributes, and XML version 1.1.
Unbounded repeats are supported
for all kinds of message including binary and formatted text.
Enhanced
support is provided for COBOL messages that use OCCURS DEPENDING ON.
The
following runtime validation improvements are provided:
- Validation options on more nodes.
- A new Validate node
to validate a message in the middle of a message flow.
- The ability to detect all validation failures in a message, before
throwing an exception.
- The ability to force a complete parse of a message independently
of runtime validation.
- Improved management
- Runtime version control
- The enhanced version control capabilities that were introduced
to the development environment in the last release have been extended
to the runtime environment. All deployed resources can be tagged with
version, author, and other useful information in addition to the standard
compiled time and deployment time attributes. The new information
is displayed in the administration interface, making it easy to see
which resources have been deployed. For more information on runtime
version control, see Message flow version and keywords.
- More automation
- New and extended command line utilities are provided to allow
full automation of the deployment to production environments of new
resources.
The Configuration Manager
Proxy (CMP) Java API is a new systems management application
interface that is provided to allow WebSphere Message
Broker to
be fully managed by products and utilities other than the Message Brokers Toolkit and the command-line interface.
For more information on the CMP, see Developing applications that use the Configuration Manager Proxy Java API.
- Improved security
- The HTTP transport has been extended to provide
HTTPS support, which provides added privacy and security.
Communication
between the Message Brokers Toolkit and
a Configuration Manager has been extended
to allow the use of SSL for added security.
- License management
- WebSphere Message
Broker supports a new form
of license management using IBM® Tivoli® License
Manager (ITLM), Version 2.1, for all the WebSphere Message
Broker platforms except z/OS. Implementing ITLM allows
sub-capacity pricing for eBusiness On Demand.
For more information
on ITLM, see Installing Tivoli License Manager.
- Code page conversion
- The set of code page converters that are used by WebSphere Message
Broker has been updated and is now
comprised of code page converters from the International Components
for Unicode (ICU) libraries for Unicode, Version 3.2. For the list
of code page converters that are included in the set, see Supported code pages.
For information on how to add additional
code page converters to the set, see Generating a new code page converter.
- WebSphere MQ as
a transaction manager
- When you use WebSphere MQ Version
6.0 as a transaction manager in a 64-bit environment, data sources
in coordinated message flows cannot connect to 32-bit DB2 instances. If data sources in
your coordinated message flows connect to DB2, ensure that they only connect
to 64-bit DB2 instances.