queue.yaml reference

Region ID

The REGION_ID is an abbreviated code that Google assigns based on the region you select when you create your app. The code does not correspond to a country or province, even though some region IDs may appear similar to commonly used country and province codes. For apps created after February 2020, REGION_ID.r is included in App Engine URLs. For existing apps created before this date, the region ID is optional in the URL.

Learn more about region IDs.

The queue.yaml configuration file is used to create and configure almost all of the task queues (push or pull) your app uses. All App Engine apps come with an automatically preconfigured push queue named default. Although you do not create the default queue yourself, you can add other queues or change the configuration of the default queue using the queue.yaml file.

For Java apps, this file is stored anywhere in the source code directory.

To configure push queues, you can use either queue.yaml or Queue Management methods from Cloud Tasks, but not both at the same time. Mixing the queue.yaml upload method with Queue Management methods can produce unexpected results and is not recommended.

To configure pull queues, you must use the queue.yaml file.

Example

The following a basic example that defines a named queue and overrides the default processing rate:

queue:
- name: my-push-queue
  rate: 1/s

The following is a more complex example of a queue.yaml configuration that demonstrates setting up the number of task tries and modifying the default processing rate.

queue:
- name: fooqueue
  rate: 1/s
  retry_parameters:
    task_retry_limit: 7
    task_age_limit: 2d
- name: barqueue
  rate: 1/s
  retry_parameters:
    min_backoff_seconds: 10
    max_backoff_seconds: 200
    max_doublings: 0
- name: bazqueue
  rate: 1/s
  retry_parameters:
    min_backoff_seconds: 10
    max_backoff_seconds: 200
    max_doublings: 3

Syntax

The queue.yaml file is a YAML file whose root directive is queue. This directive contains zero or more named queues. Each queue definition can specify the following elements:

Element Description
<bucket-size> (push queues)

Optional. A task queue uses the token bucket algorithm to control the rate of task execution. Each named queue has a token bucket that holds tokens, up to the maximum specified by the bucket_size value. Each time your application executes a task, a token is removed from the bucket. You continue processing tasks in the queue until the queue's bucket runs out of tokens. App Engine refills the bucket with new tokens continuously based on the rate that you specified for the queue.

The bucket size limits how fast the queue is processed when many tasks are in the queue and the rate is high. The maximum value for bucket size is 500. This allows you to have a high rate so processing starts shortly after a task is enqueued, but still limit resource usage when many tasks are enqueued in a short period of time.

If you don't specify bucket_size for a queue, the default value is 5. We recommend that you set this to a larger value because the default size might be too small for many use cases. For example, you could determine your bucket size based on the processing rate.

For more information on this element, see the comparative description of max_burst_size

in the Cloud Tasks API reference.
<max-concurrent-requests> (push queues)

Optional. Sets the maximum number of tasks that can be executed simultaneously from the specified queue. The value is an integer. By default, the limit is 1000 tasks per queue. The upper recommended limit is 5000 tasks per queue. Note that queues may slowly ramp up when they are first created or if they have been idle for a while.

Restricting the number of concurrent tasks gives you more control over the queue's rate of execution and can prevent too many tasks from running at once. It can also prevent datastore contention and make resources available for other queues or online processing.

For more information on this element, see the comparative description of max_concurrent_dispatches in the Cloud Tasks API reference.
<mode>

Optional. Identifies the queue mode. This setting defaults to push, which identifies a queue as a push queue. If you wish to use pull queues, set the mode to pull.

<name>

Required. The name of the queue. This is the name you specify when you call QueueFactory.getQueue().

A queue name can contain uppercase and lowercase letters, numbers, and hyphens. The maximum length for a queue name is 100 characters.

All apps have a push queue named default. This queue has a preset rate of 5 tasks per second. Note that this default queue doesn't display in the Google Cloud console until the first time it is used or configured. You can configure the default queue, including changing the default rate, by defining a queue named `default` in your queue.yaml file.

<rate> (push queues)

Required. How often tasks are processed on this queue. The value is a number followed by a slash and a unit of time, where the unit is s for seconds, m for minutes, h for hours, or d for days. For example, the value 5/m says tasks will be processed at a rate of 5 times per minute. The maximum value for rate is 500/s.

If the number is 0 (such as 0/s), the queue is considered "paused," and no tasks are processed.

For more information on this element, see the comparative description of max_dispatches_per_second in the Cloud Tasks API reference.
<retry-parameters>

Optional. Configures retry attempts for failed tasks in push queues. This addition allows you to specify the maximum number of times to retry failed tasks in a specific queue. You can also set a time limit for retry attempts and control the interval between attempts.

The retry parameters can contain the following subelements:

<task-retry-limit>
The number of retries. For example, if 0 is specified and the task fails, the task is not retried at all. If 1 is specified and the task fails, the task is retried once. If this parameter is unspecified, the task is retried indefinitely. If task_retry_limit is specified with task_age_limit, the task is retried until both limits are reached.
<task-age-limit> (push queues)
The time limit for retrying a failed task, measured from when the task was first run. The value is a number followed by a unit of time, where the unit is s for seconds, m for minutes, h for hours, or d for days. For example, the value 5d specifies a limit of five days after the task's first execution attempt. If this parameter is unspecified, the task is retried indefinitely. If specified with task_retry_limit, App Engine retries the task until both limits are reached.
<min-backoff-seconds> (push queues)
The minimum number of seconds to wait before retrying a task after it fails. The default value is 0.1.
<max-backoff-seconds> (push queues)
The maximum number of seconds to wait before retrying a task after it fails. The default value is 3600.
<max-doublings> (push queues)
The maximum number of times that the interval between failed task retries will be doubled before the increase becomes constant. The constant is: 2**max_doublings * min_backoff_seconds. The default value is 16.
<target> (push queues)

Optional. A string naming a service/version, a frontend version, or a backend, on which to execute all of the tasks enqueued onto this queue. The default value is the empty string.

The string is prepended to the domain name of your app when constructing the HTTP request for a task. For example, if your app ID is my-app and you set the target to my-version-dot-my-service, the URL hostname will be set to my-version-dot-my-service-dot-my-app.REGION_ID.r.appspot.com.

If target is unspecified, then tasks are invoked on the same version of the application where they were enqueued. So, if you enqueued a task from the default application version without specifying a target on the queue, the task is invoked in the default application version. Note that if the default application version changes between the time that the task is enqueued and the time that it executes, then the task will run in the new default version.

If you are using services along with a dispatch file, your task's HTTP request might be intercepted and re-routed to another service.

The following elements can be specified for all queues within an app:

Element Description
<total-storage-limit>

Optional. A string that overrides the default quota storage limit that is available for taskqueue storage (100M). For example: 

<queue-entries>
  <total-storage-limit>1.2G</total-storage-limit>
  <queue>
    <name>fooqueue</name>
  </queue>
</queue-entries>

This quota is part of the application's total storage quota (including the datastore and blobstore quota).

If no suffix is specified, the number that you specify is interpreted as bytes. The following suffixes are supported:

  • B (bytes)
  • K (kilobytes)
  • M (megabytes)
  • G (gigabytes)
  • T (terabytes)

If <total-storage-limit> exceeds the total disk storage that is available to an application, the limit is capped at the available storage.

Deploying the queue configuration file

The queue.yaml file can reside anywhere in your source code directory.

To deploy the queue configuration file without otherwise altering the currently serving version, use one of the following commands in the directory containing your queue file, depending on your environment:

gcloud

gcloud app deploy queue.yaml

Maven

mvn appengine:deployQueue queue.yaml

Gradle

gradle appengineDeployQueue queue.yaml

IDE

If you use IntelliJ or Eclipse, you select the individual configuration files to be deployed using the deployment form.

Deleting queues

To delete a queue:

  1. Remove the queue definition from your queue.yaml file.

  2. Upload the change to your queue.yaml file.

    gcloud app deploy queue.yaml

  3. Delete the queue in the Google Cloud console, select the queue and click Delete queue:

    Go to the Task queues page

If you delete a queue from the Google Cloud console, you must wait 7 days before recreating with the same name.