Can I send messages to a JMS queue from outside the app server?

Question

As I understand it, a J2EE container is required to include a JMS provider. Is it possible for a standalone Java application to send messages to a JMS queue provided by the container? If so, how do I access the JNDI lookups from outside the container?

(I am trying this with Geronimo if it makes any difference, but I am hoping there is a standard way of doing this.)

Answer 1

You should be able to create an InitialContext that uses the JNDI server in Geronimo. You can then use this to lookup your JMS Connection Factory and Queue.

The following example was adapted from http://forums.sun.com/thread.jspa?threadID=5283256 to use the Geronimo JNDI Factory.

Context                  jndiContext = null;
ConnectionFactory   connectionFactory = null;
Connection             connection = null;
Session                  session = null;
Queue                    queue = null;
MessageProducer     messageProducer = null;   

try
{
    //[1] Create a JNDI API InitialContext object.
    Hashtable properties = new Hashtable(2);

    // CHANGE these to match Geronimos JNDI service

    properties.put(Context.INITIAL_CONTEXT_FACTORY, "org.apache.openejb.client.RemoteInitialContextFactory");
    properties.put(Context.PROVIDER_URL, "ejbd://127.0.0.1:4201");
    jndiContext = new InitialContext(properties);

    //[2] Look up connection factory and queue.
    connectionFactory = (ConnectionFactory)jndiContext.lookup("jms/ConnectionFactory");
    queue = (Queue)jndiContext.lookup("jms/Queue");

    //[3]
    // - Create connection
    // - Create session from connection; false means session is not transacted.
    // - Create sender and text message.
    // - Send messages, varying text slightly.
    connection = connectionFactory.createConnection();
    session = connection.createSession(false, Session.AUTO_ACKNOWLEDGE);
    messageProducer = session.createProducer(queue);

   //send a message
   TextMessage message = session.createTextMessage(this.jTextSend.getText()); 
   messageProducer.send(message); 

   //example for send some object
   //ObjectMessage message = session.createObjectMessage();
   //MyObj myObj = new MyObj ("Name"); //this class must be serializable 
   //message.setObject(myObj );
   //messageProducer.send(message);
}
catch(Exception ex)
{
   LOG.error(ex);
}
finally
{
     if(connection !=null)
     {
         try
         {
             connection.close();
         }
         catch(JMSException e)
         {
              LOG.error(e);
         }
     }
}