In today’s data-driven world, systems need to communicate and react to information in real time. Whether it’s tracking a package, processing an online order, or analyzing health data, time matters.

Event streaming is a powerful architectural pattern that helps systems do exactly that – stream data as it happens and respond to events in real time. But what does that mean in practice? Let me try to explain it with a simple use case.

Imagine you walk into a busy coffee shop. Here’s how a typical transaction might unfold, and how it relates to event streaming:

Coffee Shop Example

Event Streaming Equivalent 

Customer places an order

An event happens

Order details (e.g., “Latte”)

A message/event

Order screen shows live orders

An event stream

Barista picks up the order

A consumer processes the event

Adding more order screens

Multiple consumers

Saving all orders for the day

A durable log (like a Kafka topic)

 

This simple setup will help the coffee shop run smoothly:

  • Orders are handled as they come, no waiting for batches.
  • New screens (consumers) can be added to scale operations.
  • Customers receive notifications when their drinks are ready.
  • Managers can analyze order trends and peak hours for planning.

That’s the magic of event streaming — systems stay reactive, scalable, and intelligent.

Why Is Event Streaming Important for Business?

Event streaming has become a essential to modern digital infrastructure, enabling organizations to respond to data in real time rather than waiting for scheduled batch processes. In industries like finance, event streaming powers fraud detection by analyzing transactions as they occur, allowing banks to stop suspicious activity before it causes damage to their customers.

In e-commerce, businesses use event streams to perform clickstream analysis, tailoring product recommendations and marketing in the moment based on customer behavior. For companies managing physical infrastructure or smart devices, telemetry data from IoT sensors is continuously streamed to monitor performance, detect faults, and trigger maintenance workflows automatically.

Supply chain and logistics operations also benefit from event streaming by tracking the movement of goods in real time, improving visibility and enabling faster decisions. In healthcare, event streaming supports real-time monitoring of patient vitals, helping providers detect emergencies as they unfold and act swiftly.

Use of event streaming isn’t restricted to just these use cases and industries. With the explosion of data from social media platforms, connected devices, and cloud-native applications, the demand for real-time processing has never been higher. According to industry analysts, the event stream processing market is expected to reach $5.7 billion by 2032, underscoring how critical this capability has become.

Simply put, event streaming is no longer a nice-to-have; it is table stakes for businesses that want to stay competitive, responsive, and data-driven in today’s fast-paced digital environment.

 

But Streaming Isn’t Easy — Common Challenges

While the benefits are clear, building and maintaining an event streaming system comes with hurdles:

Challenges

  

Barrier to entry

Setting up a new event streaming platform requires infrastructure investments

2-Phase Commit Problem

Coordination across messaging platform and database adds complexity in application

Security

Additional components introduce more security vulnerabilities

Data Divergence or Loss

Even small inconsistencies can lead to significant data divergence over time.

ACID Properties

Messaging systems prioritize throughput over strict ACID compliance

 

Meet Oracle TxEventQ: Streaming Built into the Database

Oracle Transactional Event Queue (TxEventQ) was introduced in Oracle database to help address these challenges. It delivers enterprise-grade streaming as a built-in, no-cost feature. TxEventQ uses a unified messaging model, supporting both publish/subscribe and point-to-point messaging in a single queue. There’s no need for separate tools or infrastructure. It’s built for scale and speed. The in-memory engine can handle over 1 billion messages per day. Developers can interact with it using language APIs, REST, or the command line. TxEventQ also supports Kafka-compatible APIs. You can migrate Kafka apps with minimal changes, skip running Kafka or Zookeeper, and connect directly to the Oracle Database, without needing any middleware. Because it’s part of Oracle Database, TxEventQ offers exactly-once delivery and full ACID compliance. Messages are processed safely, with no duplicates or data loss. 

With Oracle Database 23ai, TxEventQ gains powerful enhancements including propagation support, multi-queue Kafka transactions, and online AQ migration tools. Expanded polyglot drivers and built-in monitoring with Prometheus/Grafana further boost developer productivity and operational visibility.

Advanced Messaging Features That Matter

TxEventQ offers powerful control over how messages are processed, both when they enter the system (enqueue) and when they are consumed (dequeue):

Enqueue Features:

  • Visibility: Delay or control when a message becomes visible
  • Priority: Determine which messages get processed first
  • Delay: Schedule messages for future availability
  • Expiration: Auto-expire old messages
  • Transformation: Preprocess messages (implementation-dependent)
  • Recipient Targeting: Specify custom subscribers

Dequeue Features:

  • Visibility Options: Control message visibility during processing
  • Wait Time: Customize how long consumers wait for new messages
  • Modes: Browse (peek), lock, or remove messages
  • Filtering: Use selectors to process only relevant messages
  • Consumer Targeting: Route to specific consumer groups
  • Message ID Access: Retrieve messages by their unique ID

Why TxEventQ Is the Right Choice

Oracle Database is used by over 400,000 enterprises worldwide, including 96 of the Fortune 100.It is highly likely that you are too. This makes it easy for you to tap into event streaming without replatforming or introducing external message brokers.

Lets look at how TxEventQ can help you mitigate the challenges I stated earlier in this blog.

Challenges

  

Mitigation using TxEventQ

Barrier to entry

Setting up a new event streaming platform requires infrastructure investments

Requires no additional infrastructure

2-Phase Commit Problem

Coordination across messaging platform and database adds complexity in application

Combines atomic writes with in-memory implementation to prevent 2PC problem and to ensure high performance

Security

Additional components introduce more security vulnerabilities

TxEventQ inherits all security features of Oracle database

Data Divergence or Loss

Even small inconsistencies can lead to significant data divergence over time.

TxEventQ ensures data consistency and integrity through exactly-once delivery and robust transactional support

ACID Properties

Messaging systems prioritize throughput over strict ACID compliance

TxEventQ, as a feature within the database, adheres to ACID properties

 

 

With seamless integration, rich functionality, and no additional cost, it enables:

  • Real-time workflows
  • Scalable microservices
  • Event-driven APIs
  • Intelligent data pipelines

Final Thoughts

Event streaming is transforming how systems communicate and respond. It enables real-time decisions, better customer experiences, and faster innovation.

But as powerful as it is, it comes with complexity. That’s where Oracle TxEventQ shines by delivering a powerful, ACID-compliant event streaming engine right inside the database you are already using.

So, whether you’re modernizing your stack or just getting started with event-driven architecture, TxEventQ helps you do it smarter, faster, and more securely. And yes, at the risk of repeating myself…TxEventQ is included in Oracle Database and it’s free.

Learn more at : https://www.oracle.com/database/advanced-queuing/

Explore Oracle TxEventQ hands-on in our Oracle LiveLab: https://livelabs.oracle.com/pls/apex/dbpm/r/livelabs/view-workshop?wid=1016

Here are some additional resources that will help you get started and build your event streaming platform using Oracle TxEventQ:

If you want to reach us, please contact support: https://support.oracle.com/ (Product – Oracle Database – Enterprise Edition, Problem Type>Information Integration>Advanced Queuing. (mention TxEventQ in the description.