What Is a Message Queue and How to Use One
A checkout endpoint that resizes a product image, sends a confirmation email, and updates a recommendation engine before returning 200 OK is only as fast as its slowest step. If any one of them times out, the whole request fails. A message queue lets the endpoint hand that work off as messages and return immediately, while separate workers pick them up on their own schedule. What a message queue actually does A message queue sits between two parts of a system that don’t need to run at the same moment. A producer publishes a message describing work to be done. The queue holds it. A consumer picks it up, processes it, and acknowledges it. The two never talk to each other directly. ...