Company Joins AMQP Working Group to Support Open-Standard Information Exchange for Distributed Applications
Ottawa, Canada, April 2, 2009 – Solace Systems, the leader in messaging middleware and content networking hardware, today announced it is joining the Advanced Message Queuing Protocol (AMQP) Working Group. AMQP is a proposed open-standard application layer for messaging oriented middleware (MOM). AMQP specifies a wire protocol which would ensure interoperability between AMQP implementations from different vendors. Solace has been a licensed reviewer of AMQP for several months, and today is increasing its commitment by becoming a full member.
“We believe that development of an open standard for fully interoperable messaging between distributed applications is the missing link that will catapult messaging into the same category of protocols as TCP/IP, SMTP, and HTTP and will foster the development of new and exciting applications, ” said Ralph Frankel, Solace’s CTO. “AMQP is the protocol best positioned to break through and address the requirement for truly interoperable information exchange.”
Currently, messaging is either proprietary, built in-house, or compatible only at the API level like JMS. This means that groups of distributed applications connected via MOM software can seamlessly interact with each other, but not with applications connected using other architectural approaches or kinds of MOM software. Just as the various network protocols such as SNA, DecNet and Novell consolidated to TCP/IP resulting in significant customer savings, the same opportunity exists should AMQP succeed and see widespread adoption.
“Solace’s commitment to the AMQP working group is another indicator of the growing momentum behind the specification, ” said John O’Hara, Chairman of the AMQP Working Group and JPMorgan Distinguished Engineer. “We are happy to welcome them into the working group as we continue to advance the AMQP specification.”
Solace’s core vision is to embed application infrastructure layers, such as messaging, into hardware appliances operating as network devices with very high performance, predictable behavior and simplified operations. This view aligns closely with the current AMQP draft specification which states: “It is our aim that, through AMQP, messaging middleware capabilities may ultimately be driven into the network itself and that through the pervasive availability of messaging middleware, new kinds of useful applications may be developed.”
In addition to Solace, the AMQP Working Group today includes Cisco Systems (CSCO), Credit Suisse (CS), Deutsche Börse Systems, Envoy Technologies, Goldman Sachs (GS), iMatix Corporation, IONA Technologies (PRGS), JPMorgan Chase Bank & Co. (JPM), Microsoft Corporation (MSFT), Novell (NOVL), Rabbit Technologies, Red Hat (RHT), Tervela, TWIST Process Innovations, WSO2 and 29West. The complete AMQP specification can be found at http://jira.amqp.org/confluence/display/AMQP/Download