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Azure Queue Storage code samples using .NET version 11.x client libraries

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This article shows code samples that use version 11.x of the Azure Queue Storage client library for .NET.

On March 31, 2023, we retired support for Azure SDK libraries which do not conform to the current Azure SDK guidelines. The new Azure SDK libraries are updated regularly to drive consistent experiences and strengthen your security posture. It's recommended that you transition to the new Azure SDK libraries to take advantage of the new capabilities and critical security updates.

Although the older libraries can still be used beyond March 31, 2023, they'll no longer receive official support and updates from Microsoft. For more information, see the support retirement announcement.

For code samples using the latest version 12.x client library version, see Quickstart: Azure Queue Storage client library for .NET.

Create a Queue Storage client

The CloudQueueClient class enables you to retrieve queues stored in Queue Storage. Here's one way to create the service client:

// Retrieve storage account from connection string
CloudStorageAccount storageAccount = CloudStorageAccount.Parse(
    CloudConfigurationManager.GetSetting("StorageConnectionString"));

// Create the queue client
CloudQueueClient queueClient = storageAccount.CreateCloudQueueClient();

Create a queue

This example shows how to create a queue:

// Retrieve storage account from connection string
CloudStorageAccount storageAccount = CloudStorageAccount.Parse(
    CloudConfigurationManager.GetSetting("StorageConnectionString"));

// Create the queue client
CloudQueueClient queueClient = storageAccount.CreateCloudQueueClient();

// Retrieve a reference to a queue
CloudQueue queue = queueClient.GetQueueReference("myqueue");

// Create the queue if it doesn't already exist
queue.CreateIfNotExists();

Insert a message into a queue

To insert a message into an existing queue, first create a new CloudQueueMessage. Next, call the AddMessage method. A CloudQueueMessage can be created from either a string (in UTF-8 format) or a byte array. The following code example creates a queue (if it doesn't already exist) and inserts the message Hello, World:

// Retrieve storage account from connection string
CloudStorageAccount storageAccount = CloudStorageAccount.Parse(
    CloudConfigurationManager.GetSetting("StorageConnectionString"));

// Create the queue client
CloudQueueClient queueClient = storageAccount.CreateCloudQueueClient();

// Retrieve a reference to a queue
CloudQueue queue = queueClient.GetQueueReference("myqueue");

// Create the queue if it doesn't already exist
queue.CreateIfNotExists();

// Create a message and add it to the queue
CloudQueueMessage message = new CloudQueueMessage("Hello, World");
queue.AddMessage(message);

Peek at the next message

You can peek at the message in the front of a queue without removing it from the queue by calling the PeekMessage method.

// Retrieve storage account from connection string
CloudStorageAccount storageAccount = CloudStorageAccount.Parse(
    CloudConfigurationManager.GetSetting("StorageConnectionString"));

// Create the queue client
CloudQueueClient queueClient = storageAccount.CreateCloudQueueClient();

// Retrieve a reference to a queue
CloudQueue queue = queueClient.GetQueueReference("myqueue");

// Peek at the next message
CloudQueueMessage peekedMessage = queue.PeekMessage();

// Display message.
Console.WriteLine(peekedMessage.AsString);

Change the contents of a queued message

// Retrieve storage account from connection string.
CloudStorageAccount storageAccount = CloudStorageAccount.Parse(
    CloudConfigurationManager.GetSetting("StorageConnectionString"));

// Create the queue client.
CloudQueueClient queueClient = storageAccount.CreateCloudQueueClient();

// Retrieve a reference to a queue.
CloudQueue queue = queueClient.GetQueueReference("myqueue");

// Get the message from the queue and update the message contents.
CloudQueueMessage message = queue.GetMessage();
message.SetMessageContent2("Updated contents.", false);
queue.UpdateMessage(message,
    TimeSpan.FromSeconds(60.0),  // Make it invisible for another 60 seconds.
    MessageUpdateFields.Content | MessageUpdateFields.Visibility);

Dequeue the next message

Your code dequeues a message from a queue in two steps. When you call GetMessage, you get the next message in a queue. A message returned from GetMessage becomes invisible to any other code reading messages from this queue. By default, this message stays invisible for 30 seconds. To finish removing the message from the queue, you must also call DeleteMessage. This two-step process of removing a message assures that if your code fails to process a message due to hardware or software failure, another instance of your code can get the same message and try again. Your code calls DeleteMessage right after the message has been processed.

// Retrieve storage account from connection string
CloudStorageAccount storageAccount = CloudStorageAccount.Parse(
    CloudConfigurationManager.GetSetting("StorageConnectionString"));

// Create the queue client
CloudQueueClient queueClient = storageAccount.CreateCloudQueueClient();

// Retrieve a reference to a queue
CloudQueue queue = queueClient.GetQueueReference("myqueue");

// Get the next message
CloudQueueMessage retrievedMessage = queue.GetMessage();

//Process the message in less than 30 seconds, and then delete the message
queue.DeleteMessage(retrievedMessage);

Use the async-await pattern with common Queue Storage APIs

// Create the queue if it doesn't already exist
if(await queue.CreateIfNotExistsAsync())
{
    Console.WriteLine("Queue '{0}' Created", queue.Name);
}
else
{
    Console.WriteLine("Queue '{0}' Exists", queue.Name);
}

// Create a message to put in the queue
CloudQueueMessage cloudQueueMessage = new CloudQueueMessage("My message");

// Async enqueue the message
await queue.AddMessageAsync(cloudQueueMessage);
Console.WriteLine("Message added");

// Async dequeue the message
CloudQueueMessage retrievedMessage = await queue.GetMessageAsync();
Console.WriteLine("Retrieved message with content '{0}'", retrievedMessage.AsString);

// Async delete the message
await queue.DeleteMessageAsync(retrievedMessage);
Console.WriteLine("Deleted message");

Use additional options for dequeuing messages

The following code example uses the GetMessages method to get 20 messages in one call. Then it processes each message using a foreach loop. It also sets the invisibility timeout to five minutes for each message. The timeout starts for all messages at the same time, so after five minutes have passed since the call to GetMessages, any messages that haven't been deleted will become visible again.

// Retrieve storage account from connection string.
CloudStorageAccount storageAccount = CloudStorageAccount.Parse(
    CloudConfigurationManager.GetSetting("StorageConnectionString"));

// Create the queue client.
CloudQueueClient queueClient = storageAccount.CreateCloudQueueClient();

// Retrieve a reference to a queue.
CloudQueue queue = queueClient.GetQueueReference("myqueue");

foreach (CloudQueueMessage message in queue.GetMessages(20, TimeSpan.FromMinutes(5)))
{
    // Process all messages in less than 5 minutes, deleting each message after processing.
    queue.DeleteMessage(message);
}

Get the queue length

You can get an estimate of the number of messages in a queue. The FetchAttributes method returns queue attributes including the message count. The ApproximateMessageCount property returns the last value retrieved by the FetchAttributes method, without calling Queue Storage.

// Retrieve storage account from connection string.
CloudStorageAccount storageAccount = CloudStorageAccount.Parse(
    CloudConfigurationManager.GetSetting("StorageConnectionString"));

// Create the queue client.
CloudQueueClient queueClient = storageAccount.CreateCloudQueueClient();

// Retrieve a reference to a queue.
CloudQueue queue = queueClient.GetQueueReference("myqueue");

// Fetch the queue attributes.
queue.FetchAttributes();

// Retrieve the cached approximate message count.
int cachedMessageCount = queue.ApproximateMessageCount;

// Display number of messages.
Console.WriteLine("Number of messages in queue: " + cachedMessageCount);

Delete a queue

To delete a queue and all the messages contained in it, call the Delete method on the queue object.

// Retrieve storage account from connection string.
CloudStorageAccount storageAccount = CloudStorageAccount.Parse(
    CloudConfigurationManager.GetSetting("StorageConnectionString"));

// Create the queue client.
CloudQueueClient queueClient = storageAccount.CreateCloudQueueClient();

// Retrieve a reference to a queue.
CloudQueue queue = queueClient.GetQueueReference("myqueue");

// Delete the queue.
queue.Delete();

Work with queues

Related article: Work with Azure Queue Storage queues in .NET

In your project directory, add the following packages using the dotnet add package command:

dotnet add package Microsoft.Azure.Storage.Common

dotnet add package Microsoft.Azure.Storage.Queue

Full code sample:

using System;
using System.Threading.Tasks;
using Microsoft.Azure.Storage;
using Microsoft.Azure.Storage.Queue;

namespace QueueApp
{
    class Program
    {
        static async Task Main(string[] args)
        {
            string connectionString = Environment.GetEnvironmentVariable("AZURE_STORAGE_CONNECTION_STRING");

            CloudStorageAccount storageAccount = CloudStorageAccount.Parse(connectionString);
            CloudQueueClient queueClient = storageAccount.CreateCloudQueueClient();
            CloudQueue queue = queueClient.GetQueueReference("mystoragequeue");

            if (args.Length > 0)
            {
                string value = String.Join(" ", args);
                await InsertMessageAsync(queue, value);
                Console.WriteLine($"Sent: {value}");
            }
            else
            {
                string value = await RetrieveNextMessageAsync(queue);
                Console.WriteLine($"Received: {value}");
            }

            Console.Write("Press Enter...");
            Console.ReadLine();
        }

        static async Task InsertMessageAsync(CloudQueue theQueue, string newMessage)
        {
            if (await theQueue.CreateIfNotExistsAsync())
            {
                Console.WriteLine("The queue was created.");
            }

            CloudQueueMessage message = new CloudQueueMessage(newMessage);
            await theQueue.AddMessageAsync(message);
        }

        static async Task<string> RetrieveNextMessageAsync(CloudQueue theQueue)
        {
            bool exists = await theQueue.ExistsAsync();

            if (exists)
            {
                CloudQueueMessage retrievedMessage = await theQueue.GetMessageAsync();

                if (retrievedMessage != null)
                {
                    string theMessage = retrievedMessage.AsString;
                    await theQueue.DeleteMessageAsync(retrievedMessage);
                    return theMessage;
                }
                else
                {
                    Console.Write("The queue is empty. Attempt to delete it? (Y/N) ");
                    string response = Console.ReadLine();

                    if (response.ToUpper() == "Y")
                    {
                        await theQueue.DeleteIfExistsAsync();
                        return "The queue was deleted.";
                    }
                    else
                    {
                        return "The queue was not deleted.";
                    }
                }
            }
            else
            {
                return "The queue does not exist. Add a message to the command line to create the queue and store the message.";
            }
        }
    }
}