I have been trying to figure out, what exactly a inbound end point and outbound end point. For me it is bit of an eluding to understand.
what are exactly inbound and outbound endpoints for/do in mule flow? if a flow wants send message which endpoint shoud be used viz when receiving. Or when an application want to invoke a flow which end point it should communicate to?
Inbound endpoints are message sources (http://www.mulesoft.org/documentation/display/current/Message+Sources), which as the name suggests is where messages are created. They can be created based on external events (like an incoming HTTP request or JMS message) or by polling (like files in a directory).
Outbound endpoints and anything else you see in a flow (except exception strategies) are message processors (http://www.mulesoft.org/documentation/display/current/Message+Processors), which means they do something with the message in-flight the flow. Outbound endpoints are message processors that send the current message to "destinations" like a JMS queue, an HTTP server, a file, ...
Disclaimer: This is a simplified view to give you a general idea, its not the beginning or end of what you can do with mule (or other service buses)
Mule is a message processing engine. You can think of it as a giant conveyer belt. You put something on one end, and it goes along the belt and comes out the other end.
The thing that mule deals with are called messages.
The starting point is the "inbound end point" and the exit point is the "outbound end point"; between these pairs of end points you can have other things that will process the message as it travels from the start to the end.
A combination of a start end point + gubbins in the middle to do some work on the message + outbound end point is called a flow. You can chain flows together to create a workflow or process.
These processes are then packaged as an application and uploaded to the mule server. The process only runs when a message that it is listening for arrives. Otherwise the processes are sitting idle. Think of it like a car assembly line. The assembly line that fixes the seats in the car can only start when the chassis is finished; otherwise there is nothing for it to do. Once the seats are fixed, only then can the paint assembly line start, and so on.
There are two types of connectors available based on operation.
Inbound Endpoint based connector : Inbound endpoint based connectors are the connectors which is placed inside a message source area of a mule flow which is used to start executing or triggering off the flow upon receiving the request. (or which is used to receive the incoming request and pass the request to the next message processors in a flow for further processing)
Outbound Endpoint or Process based connector: Outbound Endpoint based connectors are placed anywhere within a message processor area of a flow at beginning or in the middle or at the end.
Regards,
Rajnish
Giving below the structure definition of Mule Message Object has Message Inbound Property Outbound Property Payload Variable Flow Variable Session Variable Attachment Exception Payload
When a connector of a flow (listening on a port) receives the payload its called Inbound endpoint. When in a flow we have a connectore placed in the middle and send a payload its called Oubound endpoint. Here the all the outbound properties sent to the Http Outbound flow become Inbound Properties within that flow.
For detailed explanation see the link below.
https://docs.mulesoft.com/mule-user-guide/v/3.8/mule-message-structure.
