Apache ActiveMQ ™ -- Selectors

Features > Consumer Features > Selectors

JMS Selectors

Selectors are a way of attaching a filter to a subscription to perform content based routing. Selectors are defined using SQL 92 syntax and typically apply to message headers; whether the standard properties available on a JMS message or custom headers you can add via the JMS code.

Here is an example

JMSType = 'car' AND color = 'blue' AND weight > 2500

For more documentation on the detail of selectors see the reference on javax.jmx.Message.
ActiveMQ supports some JMS defined properties, as well as some ActiveMQ ones - see message properies - that the selector can use.

Using XPath to filter messages

Apache ActiveMQ also supports XPath based selectors when working with messages containing XML bodies. To use an XPath selector use the following syntax

XPATH '//title[@lang=''eng'']'

Xalan dependency

XPath support requires Xalan which is not part of the distribution. The Xalan jars needs to be manually added to lib directory or pulled into your app via maven

String Property Conversions / Selecting Against STOMP messages

The JMS spec states that a String property should not get converted to a numeric when used in a selector. So for example, if a message has the 'age' property set to String '21' then the following selector should not match it: 'age > 18'. Since ActiveMQ support STOMP client which can only send messages with string properties, that restriction is a bit limiting. If you want your JMS selectors to auto-convert String properties the the appropriate number type, just prefix the the selector with 'convert_string_expressions:'. If you changed selector in the previous example to be 'convert_string_expressions:age > 18', then it would match the message.