This section explains the best practices to be followed when creating mediation sequences in the following scenarios.
General best practices
Following are some general best practices that you can follow when working with mediators.
Use Iterator mediator in association with Aggregate mediator.
Check if they have done any configuration after send mediator.
Check if they have done proper error handling to handle mediation errors as well as endpoint errors.
Check if they have used get-property instead of $ctx.
Check if they have used appropriate intervals for tasks.
Last mediator in a sequence
The last mediator in a mediation sequence should be one of the following mediators depending on the scenario. Any mediator added after one of the following mediators will not be applied.
- Drop mediator: when you want to stop the mediation flow at a particular point (e.g., when a filter condition is not met).
- Loopback mediator: when you want the message to be moved from the In sequence to the Out sequence. Note that the Loopback mediator only prevents the subsequent mediators in the In sequence from being applied.
- Respond mediator: when you want the message to be sent back to the client.
- Send Mediator: when you want the message to be sent to the specified endpoint. If a message should be further mediated after it is sent, you can use the Clone mediator to make two copies of the message and process them separately, thereby avoiding conflicts.
Defining the In and Out sequences
The In and Out sequences are separately defined for proxy services and REST APIs. Therefore, In and Out mediators should not be used in proxy service and REST API configurations. However, they should be used in the main sequence.
The correct usage of the Loopback mediator
Once a message has been passed from the In sequence (request path) to the Out sequence (response path), it cannot be moved to the Out sequence again via the Loopback mediator.
Reusing a defined sequence
In order to repeatedly use the same mediation sequence, you can define it and save it in the Synapse configuration or the Registry with a unique name as described in Adding a Mediation Sequence. This mediation sequence can then be called from the main sequence as well as multiple proxy services and REST APIs. The saved sequence can be called via the Sequence mediator or selected as the In/Out/Fault sequence when defining a proxy service or a REST API.
The correct usage of the Sequence mediator
The Sequence mediator calls a Mediation Sequence saved in the Synapse configuration or the Registry with a unique name. The In, Out or Fault sequence of a proxy service, REST API or the Main sequence cannot be called via this mediator.