Developing MQI applications with IBM MQ

IBM® MQ provides support for C, Visual Basic, COBOL, Assembler, RPG, pTAL, and PL/I. These procedural languages use the message queue interface (MQI) to access message queuing services.

For detailed information about how to write your applications in your chosen language, see the subtopics.

For an overview of the call interface for procedural languages, see Call descriptions. This topic contains a list of the MQI calls, and each call shows you how to code the calls in each of these languages.

IBM MQ provides data definition files to help you to write your applications. For a full description, see IBM MQ data definition files.

To help you choose which procedural language to code your programs in, consider the maximum length of the messages that your programs will process. If your programs will process only messages of a known maximum length, you can code them in any of the supported languages. If you do not know the maximum length of the messages that the programs will have to process, the language you choose will depend on whether you are writing a CICS®, IMS, or batch application:

IMS and batch: Code the programs in C, PL/I, or assembler language to use the facilities these languages offer for obtaining and releasing arbitrary amounts of memory. Alternatively, you could code your programs in COBOL, but use assembler language, PL/I, or C subroutines to get and release storage.
CICS: Code the programs in any language supported by CICS. The EXEC CICS interface provides the calls for managing memory, if necessary.