Exploring Apache Camel Core - File Component
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Join For FreeA file poller is a very useful mechanism to solve common IT problems. Camel’s built-in file component is extremely flexible, and there are many options available for configuration. Let’s cover few common usages here.
Polling a Directory for Input Files
Here is a typical Camel Route used to poll a directory for input files every second.
import org.slf4j.*;
import org.apache.camel.*;
import org.apache.camel.builder.*;
import java.io.*;
public class FileRouteBuilder extends RouteBuilder {
static Logger LOG = LoggerFactory.getLogger(FileRouteBuilder.class);
public void configure() {
from("file://target/input?delay=1000")
.process(new Processor() {
public void process(Exchange msg) {
File file = msg.getIn().getBody(File.class);
LOG.info("Processing file: " + file);
}
});
}
}Run this with following:
mvn compile exec:java -Dexec.mainClass=org.apache.camel.main.Main -Dexec.args='-r camelcoredemo.FileRouteBuilder'
The program will begin to poll your target/input folder under your current directory and wait for incoming files. To test with input files, you would need to open another terminal and then create some files like this:
echo 'Hello 1' > target/input/test1.txt echo 'Hello 2' > target/input/test2.txt
You should now see the first prompt window start picking up the files and passing them to the next Processor step. In the Processor, we obtain the File object from the message body. It then simply logs its file name. You may hit CTRL+C when you are done.
There many configurable options from the file component. You may use this in the URL, but most of the default settings are enough to get you going as the simple case above shows us. Some of these default behaviors are such that if the input folder doesn’t exist, it will create it. And when the file is done processing by the Route, it will be moved into a .camel folder. If you don’t want the file at all after processing, then set delete=true in the URL.
Reading in the File Content and Converting to Different Types
By default, the file component will create a org.apache.camel.component.file.GenericFile object for each file found and pass it down your Route as message body. You may retrieve all your file information through this object. Alternatively, you may also use the Exchange API to auto convert the message body object to a type you expect to receive (eg: as with msg.getIn().getBody(File.class)). In the example above, the File is a type you expect to get from the message body, and Camel will try to convert it for you. Camel uses the context’s registry space to pre-register many TypeConverter's that can handle the conversion of most of the common data types (like Java primitives). These TypeConverters are a powerful way to make your Route and Processor more flexible and portable.
Camel will not only convert just your File object from a message body, but it can also read the file content. If your files are character text based, then you can simply do this.
from("file://target/input?charset=UTF-8")
.process(new Processor() {
public void process(Exchange msg) {
String text = msg.getIn().getBody(String.class);
LOG.info("Processing text: " + text);
}
});That’s it! Simply specify that it is a String type, and Camel will read your file and pass in the entire file text content as a body message. You may even use the charset to change the encoding.
If you are dealing with a binary file, then simply try byte[] bytes =msg.getIn().getBody(byte[].class); conversion instead. Pretty cool huh?
Polling and Processing Large Files
When working with large files, there are a few options in the file component that you might want to use to ensure proper handling. For example, you might want to move the input file into a staging folder before the Route starts the processing; and when it’s done, move it to a .completed folder.
from("file://target/input?preMove=staging&move=.completed")
.process(new Processor() {
public void process(Exchange msg) {
File file = msg.getIn().getBody(File.class);
LOG.info("Processing file: " + file);
}
});To feed input files properly into the polling folder, it’s best if the sender generates the input files in a temporary folder first, and only when it’s ready then move it into the polling folder. This will minimize reading an incomplete file by the Route if the input file might take time to generate. Another solution to this is to configure the file endpoint to only read the polling folder when there is a signal or when a ready-marker file exists. For example:
from("file://target/input?preMove=staging&move=.completed&doneFileName=ReadyFile.txt")
.process(new Processor() {
public void process(Exchange msg) {
File file = msg.getIn().getBody(File.class);
LOG.info("Processing file: " + file);
}
});The code above will only read the target/input folder when a ReadyFile.txt file exists. The marker file can just be an empty file, and it will be removed by Camel after polling. This solution would allow the sender to generate input files in no matter how long it takes.
Another concern with large file processing is avoiding loading a file's entire content into memory for processing. To be more practical, you want to split the file into records (eg: per line) and process it one by one (this is called "streaming"). Here is how you would do that using Camel.
from("file://target/input?preMove=staging&move=.completed")
.split(body().tokenize("\n"))
.streaming()
.process(new Processor() {
public void process(Exchange msg) {
String line = msg.getIn().getBody(String.class);
LOG.info("Processing line: " + line);
}
});This Route will allow you to process large size file without consuming too much memory, and it will process it line-by-line very efficiently.
Writing Messages Back into File
The file component can also be used to write messages into files. Recall that we may use dataset components to generate sample messages. We will use that to feed the Route and send it to the file component so you can see that each message generated will be saved into a file.
package camelcoredemo;
import org.slf4j.*;
import org.apache.camel.*;
import org.apache.camel.builder.*;
import org.apache.camel.main.Main;
import org.apache.camel.component.dataset.*;
public class FileDemoCamel extends Main {
static Logger LOG = LoggerFactory.getLogger(FileDemoCamel.class);
public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception {
FileDemoCamel main = new FileDemoCamel();
main.enableHangupSupport();
main.addRouteBuilder(createRouteBuilder());
main.bind("sampleGenerator", createDataSet());
main.run(args);
}
static RouteBuilder createRouteBuilder() {
return new RouteBuilder() {
public void configure() {
from("dataset://sampleGenerator")
.to("file://target/output");
}
};
}
static DataSet createDataSet() {
return new SimpleDataSet();
}
}Compile and run it.
mvn compile exec:java -Dexec.mainClass=camelcoredemo.FileDemoCamel
Upon completion, you will see that 10 files would be generated in the target/output folder with the file name in ID-<hostname>-<unique-number>-<msg-seq-num> format.
There are more options availabe from File component that you may explore. Try it out with a Route and see for yourself.
Published at DZone with permission of Zemian Deng, DZone MVB. See the original article here.
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