Send a request with enough metadata to identify where and how to respond.
Message Construction
Return Address
Include the reply destination with the request so the provider can respond without being coupled to a specific caller or hardcoded channel.
How does a replier know where to send the reply?Adapted from Enterprise Integration Patterns under CC BY 3.0. The visualization and explanatory content on this page are original GateSift material.
Original GateSift visualization
How Return Address works
A request and its response are connected even when messaging is asynchronous.
Request
Return Address
Reply
Apply Return Address to preserve the reply path or correlation context.
Return the response to the correct requester and match it to the original request.
What this pattern helps you decide
Include the reply destination with the request so the provider can respond without being coupled to a specific caller or hardcoded channel.
What happens when processing fails or the same message is delivered twice?
Where does state, correlation or routing configuration live?
How will operators trace the message and understand the decision path?
Where you may see it
- Service Bus ReplyTo
- HTTP callback URL
- BizTalk solicit-response configuration
How the analyzers can surface it
- Reply and callback destinations
- Two-way endpoint configuration
Pattern detection is contextual. GateSift should present these as architectural signals, not claim a pattern is implemented solely because one policy statement or adapter exists.
Source, licence and attribution
The pattern name and selected problem statement are adapted from Enterprise Integration Patterns by Gregor Hohpe and Bobby Woolf under CC BY 3.0. GateSift summaries, Azure mappings, analyzer guidance and diagrams are original. No endorsement by the original authors is implied.