I have an MVC web site, a storage queue and a WebJob. Users can request the generation of a set of reports by clicking a button on the web page. This inserts a message into the storage queue. In the past, the WebJob ran continuously and processed those requests fine. But the demand and size of the reports has grown to the point where the WebJob is slowing down the web app. I would like to still place the request message in the queue, but delay processing of all requests until the evening, when the web app is mostly idle. This would allow me to continue using the WebJob code and QueueTrigger functionality without having to waste resources by moving to a dedicated Worker Role, etc. The reports don't need to be generated immediately, so a delay is acceptable.
I don't see a built-in way to set a time window on processing. The only thing I have found is a powershell cmdlet for starting and stopping WebJobs (Start-AzureWebsiteJob / Stop-AzureWebsiteJob). So I was thinking that I could create a scheduled powershell job that runs at midnight, starts the webjob, lets it run, and then runs again early in the AM and stops it.
Does anyone know of a better option than this? Anything more "official" that perhaps I could not find?
One possible solution would be to hide the messages in the queue for a certain amount of time when they are inserted.
If you're using AddMessage method, you can specify this timespan value in initialVisibilityDelay parameter.
What this will do is ensure that the messages are not immediately visible in the queue to be picked by WebJob and will become visible only when this timespan elapses.
Will such a solution work for you?