Camel Inbound Channel

2026.1.0+

The Camel inbound channel uses Apache Camel components to receive events from systems that are not covered by the built-in channel implementations. Instead of a messaging broker, the channel polls (or listens to) a Camel endpoint and turns every message it picks up into an event that is handed to the regular inbound pipeline.

The following Camel channel types are available out of the box:

• File - poll a directory on the Flowable server for incoming files
• FTP - poll a directory on a remote FTP server
• SFTP - poll a directory on a remote SFTP server
• SQL - poll rows from a database table
• Azure Service Bus - receive messages from an Azure Service Bus queue or topic
• Custom - provide a raw Camel endpoint URI for any other Camel component

Enabling the Camel integration

The Camel integration is disabled by default. To enable it, set the following property in the application.properties configuration file:

flowable.eventregistry.camel.enabled=true

note

The Camel dependencies are added by default when using Flowable Work/Engage, so no further action is needed there. The relevant Camel component is only required for the channel type you actually use: camel-file for File, camel-ftp for FTP and SFTP, camel-sql for SQL, and the Flowable Azure Service Bus component for Azure Service Bus.

If you're building your own Spring Boot project with Flowable dependencies, add the flowable-platform-camel dependency (together with the Camel component starters for the types you need) to your pom.xml:

 <dependency>
   <groupId>com.flowable.platform</groupId>
   <artifactId>flowable-platform-camel</artifactId>
 </dependency>

Selecting a Camel channel type

In the channel model editor, set Inbound/Outbound to Inbound and the Implementation to Camel. A Type dropdown then appears in which the Camel channel type is selected.

Selecting a type shows the fields that are relevant for that type. Behind the scenes, Flowable assembles a Camel consumer endpoint URI from these fields in the form <type>:<address>?<option>=<value>&..., so every field maps directly onto a Camel endpoint option. Fields marked with a red asterisk (*) are required.

File

Consumes files from a directory on the Flowable server. Each file that is picked up becomes a single event.

Field	Required	Description
Directory	Yes	Base directory path to monitor for incoming files.
File name	No	Ant-style glob filter (e.g. *.xml, **/*.csv).
Recursive	No	Whether to scan subdirectories.
Delay	No	Milliseconds between directory polls.
Initial delay	No	Milliseconds to wait before starting to poll.
Delete after processing	No	Whether to delete files after successful processing.
Move failed files to directory	No	Directory for files that failed processing.
Idempotent	No	Skip already-processed files.
Charset	No	Encoding for file read/write.
Include hidden directories	No	Include dot-prefixed directories.
Include hidden files	No	Include dot-prefixed files.
Greedy	No	Rerun immediately if the previous poll found messages.

FTP

Polls a directory on a remote FTP server.

Field	Required	Description
Host and directory	Yes	FTP server address in the format host:port/directory.
File name	No	Ant-style glob filter (e.g. *.xml, **/*.csv).
Passive mode	No	Use passive mode for FTP data transfers.
Delay	No	Milliseconds between directory polls.
Initial delay	No	Milliseconds to wait before starting to poll.
No-op	No	Do not move or delete files after processing.
Username	Yes	Username for FTP authentication.
Password	Yes	Password for FTP authentication.

SFTP

Polls a directory on a remote SFTP server. Supports both password and private-key based authentication.

Field	Required	Description
Host and directory	Yes	SFTP server address in the format host:port/directory.
File name	No	Ant-style glob filter (e.g. *.xml, **/*.csv).
Delay	No	Milliseconds between directory polls.
Initial delay	No	Milliseconds to wait before starting to poll.
No-op	No	Do not move or delete files after processing.
Known hosts file	No	Path to the known_hosts file for host key verification.
Strict host key checking	No	Host key checking mode: yes, no, or ask.
Username	Yes	Username for SFTP authentication.
Password	No	Password for SFTP authentication.
Private key file	No	Path to the private key file for key-based authentication.
Private key passphrase	No	Passphrase for the private key file.

SQL

Polls rows from a database table. Each row that is returned becomes a single event.

Field	Required	Description
SQL query	Yes	SQL SELECT query to poll for new rows, e.g. SELECT * FROM events WHERE processed = false.
Data source	No	Spring bean reference for the data source, e.g. #dataSource.
On consume query	No	SQL query executed after each row is processed, e.g. UPDATE events SET processed = true WHERE id = :#ID.
On consume failed query	No	SQL query executed when row processing fails.
Delay	No	Milliseconds between poll cycles.
Initial delay	No	Milliseconds to wait before starting to poll.
Max messages per poll	No	Maximum number of rows to process per poll cycle.

Azure Service Bus

Receives messages from an Azure Service Bus queue or topic subscription. Flowable ships a lightweight Azure Service Bus component that communicates over AMQP 1.0, so the full Azure SDK is not required.

Field	Required	Description
Queue or topic name	Yes	The name of the Azure Service Bus queue or topic.
Service Bus type	No	Whether to consume from a queue or a topic subscription (Queue or Topic).
Subscription name	No	The subscription name when consuming from a topic.
Delay	No	Milliseconds between poll cycles.
Initial delay	No	Milliseconds to wait before starting to poll.
Connection string	Yes	The connection string for the Azure Service Bus namespace.

Custom source URI

If the channel type you need is not in the list, select Custom and provide the full Camel endpoint URI in the Source URI field (e.g. direct:start or timer:tick?period=5000). The channel then consumes from that endpoint directly, allowing any Camel component available on the classpath to be used.

Pipeline

The pipeline configuration is the same for all channels. See Inbound Pipeline for more details.