A simple but extensible message broker for .NET based on the TPL Dataflow Library
Provides message passing between loosely coupled components (often referred to as an Actor pattern).
Please note that this is a work in progress and the API may change at any time before hitting a 1.0 stable version.
Features
- Generic typed methods for compile time safety
- Supports asynchronous programming model (async/await)
- Send through multiple different protocols at once (via different dispatchers)
Usage
Construct MessageBroker or use singleton Instance property if desired.
MessageBroker broker = new MessageBroker();
Add a dispatcher to the broker. To broker messages in-process, use MessageDispatcher.
broker.AddDispatcher(new MessageDispatcher(broker));
To send a message, create a class inherited from the Message class and call one of Send or SendAsync on the broker. To send a generic payload use the generic Message<T> class.
public class TestMessage : Message
{
}
TestMessage m = new TestMessage();
broker.Send(m);
To listen to a message, use the Listen methods on the broker, passing a handler in the form of either an Action<T> delegate or Func<T, Task> delegate (to handle the message in an asynchronous fashion).
broker.Listen<TestMessage>(m =>
{
Console.WriteLine("Test message received");
});
To wait for a response to a message, use the AwaitResponse method on the returned object from the Send method.
TestMessage m = new TestMessage();
MessageToken token = broker.Send(m);
await TestResponseMessage response = token.AwaitResponse<TestResponseMessage>();
Note that AwaitResponse only supports await at the moment, there is no synchronous equivalent. This may be changed in the future.
More docs to come.