IBM WebSphere MQ WCF Channel has problem with clustered Queues

The Enterprise Architecture roadmap of customer aims at a SAP-unless policy, and SharePoint for all web-applications/front-ends. Currently there are still multiple applications in their IT landscape which do not obey do this future direction. For some of them, e.g. J2EE based service application, the enterprise architecture integration guidelines prescribes that the client-services communication occurs via IBM WebSphere MQ (WMQ). From the .NET client perspective, WCF based communication is nowadays preferred and proven technology, and must be applied for any new web-applications that invoke other applications.

For .NET client context there are in reality 2 viable WCF Channel options for putting requests as messages on an IBM WebSphere Queue (WCF WMQ). One is part of Microsoft Host Integration Server, the other one is provided by IBM.

For reasons explained else, the.NET and Integration architects decided to apply the IBM WebSphere MQ Channel for WCF. It is successful applied in several .NET applications to put messages on WMQ. In my current application project we also need to invoke services of a ‘legacy’ system, callable over WMQ. However, when this application puts a message on the assigned Queue via Request-Reply, we ran into the following exception:

System.ServiceModel.EndpointNotFoundException was unhandled by user code
Message=WCFCH0309E: An error occurred while attempting to open the channel for endpoint 'jms:/queue?destination=APPL.REQ.QUEUE@XXXX01&connectionFactory=connectQueueManager(XXXX01)clientChannel(WMQ.Channel.TST)clientConnection(dev-xx.xxx.com(7201))&initialContextFactory=com.ibm.mq.jms.Nojndi&persistence=1&replyDestination=APPL.RPL.QUEUE' The operation could not be completed. The endpoint may be down, unavailable, or unreachable, review the linked exception for further details.
Source=mscorlib
StackTrace:
Server stack trace:
at IBM.XMS.WCF.XmsChannelHelper.ThrowCommsException(OperationType op, Exception innerException, String endpointURI)
at IBM.XMS.WCF.XmsChannelHelper.CheckExceptionAndTimeout(OperationType op, Exception e, String timeout, String endpointURI)
at IBM.XMS.WCF.XmsRequestChannel.OnEndOpen(IAsyncResult result)
at IBM.XMS.WCF.XmsRequestChannel.OnOpen(TimeSpan timeout)
at System.ServiceModel.Channels.CommunicationObject.Open(TimeSpan timeout)
at System.ServiceModel.Channels.ServiceChannel.OnOpen(TimeSpan timeout)
at System.ServiceModel.Channels.CommunicationObject.Open(TimeSpan timeout)
at System.ServiceModel.Channels.ServiceChannel.CallOnceManager.CallOnce(TimeSpan timeout, CallOnceManager cascade)
at System.ServiceModel.Channels.ServiceChannel.EnsureOpened(TimeSpan timeout)
at System.ServiceModel.Channels.ServiceChannel.Call(String action, Boolean oneway, ProxyOperationRuntime operation, Object[] ins, Object[] outs, TimeSpan timeout)
at System.ServiceModel.Channels.ServiceChannel.Request(Message message, TimeSpan timeout)
Exception rethrown at [0]:
at System.Runtime.Remoting.Proxies.RealProxy.HandleReturnMessage(IMessage reqMsg, IMessage retMsg)
at System.Runtime.Remoting.Proxies.RealProxy.PrivateInvoke(MessageData& msgData, Int32 type)
at System.ServiceModel.Channels.IRequestChannel.Request(Message message)
at Application.<CustomCode>.Client.<InvocateAMethod>(MethodRequest_1_0 request)
at System.Web.UI.WebControls.Button.OnClick(EventArgs e)
at System.Web.UI.WebControls.Button.RaisePostBackEvent(String eventArgument)
at System.Web.UI.Page.RaisePostBackEvent(IPostBackEventHandler sourceControl, String eventArgument)
at System.Web.UI.Page.ProcessRequestMain(Boolean includeStagesBeforeAsyncPoint, Boolean includeStagesAfterAsyncPoint)
InnerException: IBM.XMS.IllegalStateException
Message=Failed to open MQ queue APPL.REQ.QUEUE. XMS attempted to perform an MQOPEN, but WebSphere MQ reported an error. Use the linked exception to determine the cause of this error. Check that the specified queue and queue manager are defined correctly.
Source=IBM.XMS.Client.WMQ
ErrorCode=XMSWMQ2008

It took me several hours and diverse try-outs together with an MQ developer at the receiving WebSphere MQ side, to ultimately find out the following. The IBM WCF transport channel for WMQ (WebSphere MQ 7.0.1 installation) has a problem with clustered queues, and errors when attempting to open the queue. In case of putting messages to a non-clustered queue – the WMQ infrastructure of the other .NET applications -, the channel opens successfully and messages request + replies are delivered. The problem is reproduced outside the context of our SharePoint application, via a simple testprogram; thus appears to be structural. We are currently addressing IBM to analyze it, and come up with a structural solution. For now, the pragmatic solution appears to communicate via non-clustered Queue.