I have logged this JIRA issue:
http://java.net/jira/browse/JMS_SPEC-41
This issue was raised by Tom Barnes, though the wording below is my own.
Tom: Can you please confirm that this captures your requirement accurately, and provide some more specific information
about what you have in mind? I suggest we wait for this before discussing it in too much detail.
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It is proposed that the JMS specification supports "topic hierarchies". These are also known as subject hierarchies or
wildcard subscriptions.
The JMS 1.1 specification states that a topic is a "well-known node in a content-based hierarchy" but does not specify
how this hierarchy is used, how topics are named, or define any special functionality to operate on more than one node
of the hierarchy at the same time.
It is proposed that new features are added to JMS to explicitly support the use of topic hierarchies. More detailed
proposals will follow: this JIRA issue is a placeholder.
Most JMS vendors and (and other pub/sub products) already support topic hierarchies, and they are integral to a variety
of standards, including AMQP, Web Services Event Notification, and the Bayeaux protocol. They provide an intuitive
solution for optimized message filtering, routing, and replication. Support for topic hierarchies would also be helpful
for simplifying the integration of JMS applications into messaging environments that already depend on topic hierarchies.
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