A message point is associated with a messaging engine and holds
messages for a bus destination.
A message point is the general term for the location on a messaging engine
where messages are held for a bus destination. A message point can be:
- A queue point
- A publication point
- A mediation point (this is a specialized message point)
For point-to-point messaging, the administrator selects one bus member,
which can be an application server,
to hold the messages of the queue destination. This action automatically defines
a
queue point for
each messaging engine in the
assigned bus member.
- For a queue destination assigned to an application server, all messages
sent to that destination are handled by the messaging engine of that server,
and message order is preserved.

For publish/subscribe messaging, the administrator configures a topic space
destination, but does not need to assign a bus member for the topic space.
A topic space has a publication point defined automatically for each messaging engine in the bus.
Message points can be remote from the application which
is producing to or consuming from the bus destination. In other words, message
points can reside on a messaging engine other than the messaging engine to
which the application is connected. In this situation the message point is
represented at runtime by a remote message point on the remote messaging
engine.
![[Version 6.0.2]](../was602.gif)
By monitoring message points and remote message points,
you can fully analyze and resolve problems arising from distributed application
messaging. For example, you can:
- Determine the state of a specific message request.
- Determine the location of a specific message.
- Examine message queues to determine if messages have been sent or received.
- Free or delete message requests that have become locked.
- Delete or move messages from remote message points.