Explain the common technical complexities and patterns in integration development18% of the exam
Aggregation, orchestration and choreography composition patterns
How the three composition patterns place control: aggregation fans one request out in parallel and combines the results with Scatter-Gather, orchestration puts the logic in a central controller, and choreography lets each service know its own part with no coordinator.
Explain the differences between the aggregation, orchestration, and choreography composition patterns.
~6 min read · 4 practice questions ·
What the exam expects
- Identify orchestration from a design where one central controller knows the business logic and the order of calls.
- Identify choreography from a design where services react to one another with no central orchestrator.
- Identify composition aggregation from a requirement to call several sources at once and return one combined result, and name Scatter-Gather as the Mule router for it.
- Explain why the three patterns are not interchangeable: each places the business logic somewhere different.
Key terms:
- Composition pattern: a way of combining several services into a higher-level service.
- Orchestration: a central controller couples the services and alone knows the logic and messaging sequence.
- Choreography: no central messaging engine; each participating service knows the logic, sequence and timing.
- Aggregation (composition): one request fans out to several routes in parallel and the results combine into one event.
- Scatter-Gather: the Mule router that runs routes in parallel and combines their results.
Key facts
Orchestration control
- Detail
- A central controller couples the services
Typical orchestrator
- Detail
- A central messaging engine such as an ESB
Choreography control
- Detail
- No central messaging engine or orchestrator
Scatter-Gather execution
- Detail
- Routes run in parallel, each on its own thread
Minimum routes
- Detail
- At least two, or the app does not start
Route failure
- Detail
- Router throws
MULE:COMPOSITE_ROUTINGand the flow branches to error handling
Choice router
- Detail
- Picks one of two or more routes
- Why does a Scatter-Gather with only one route stop the app from starting?
- When two Scatter-Gather routes change the same variable, what value remains?
- Why did ESBs become the usual tool for service orchestration?
- What does the For Each scope do with a collection?
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