Configuration Reference

All configuration in Emit is validated at startup via IValidateOptions<T>. Misconfiguration surfaces as a startup error, not a runtime surprise.

Outbox options

Applies to both MongoDB and EF Core when UseOutbox() is called on the persistence provider. These options control the background worker that delivers outbox entries to the broker. All producers route through the outbox by default when outbox infrastructure is configured; use topic.Producer(p => p.UseDirect()) to opt out.

Option	Default	Range	Description
PollingInterval	5s	min 1s	Minimum time between poll cycles. The next poll starts immediately if the previous batch took longer than this interval.
BatchSize	100	1-10000	Max entries fetched per cycle, ordered by sequence (FIFO).

Kafka client options

ConfigureClient maps directly to Confluent.Kafka’s ClientConfig. All standard Confluent.Kafka client properties are available. Common ones:

Option	Description
BootstrapServers	(required) Comma-separated broker addresses
ClientId	Client identifier reported to the broker
SecurityProtocol	Plaintext, Ssl, SaslPlaintext, or SaslSsl
SaslMechanism	Plain, ScramSha256, ScramSha512, or Gssapi
SaslUsername / SaslPassword	SASL credentials
SslCaLocation	Path to the CA certificate file

Producer routing options

Method	Description
UseDirect()	Forces the producer to send directly to the broker, bypassing the outbox. Only meaningful when outbox infrastructure is configured.

Kafka producer options

ConfigureProducer maps to Confluent.Kafka’s ProducerConfig. Common options:

Option	Default	Description
Acks	Leader	Acknowledgement level: None, Leader, or All
EnableIdempotence	false	Prevents duplicate messages on retry
CompressionType	None	Gzip, Snappy, Lz4, or Zstd
Linger	0	Batching delay before sending

Consumer and handler options

Attribute	Description
[Transactional]	Applied to a consumer or mediator handler class. The pipeline wraps the handler invocation in a unit of work; the transaction commits on success and rolls back on failure.

Kafka consumer group options

Emit-specific options:

Option	Default	Description
WorkerCount	1	Number of parallel workers
WorkerDistribution	ByKeyHash	ByKeyHash or RoundRobin
BufferSize	32	Per-worker channel capacity
CommitInterval	5s	Offset commit frequency
WorkerStopTimeout	30s	Graceful shutdown wait for in-flight messages

Confluent consumer options (also settable on the group):

Option	Description
AutoOffsetReset	Where to start when no committed offset exists: Earliest or Latest
SessionTimeout	Broker marks the consumer dead after this period without a heartbeat
HeartbeatInterval	How often the consumer sends heartbeats to the broker
MaxPollInterval	Maximum time between poll calls before the broker considers the consumer dead
IsolationLevel	ReadUncommitted or ReadCommitted (for transactional producers)

Schema Registry options

ConfigureSchemaRegistry maps to Confluent.Kafka’s SchemaRegistryConfig. Common options:

Option	Description
Url	(required) Schema Registry URL
BasicAuthUserInfo	Credentials in user:password format
RequestTimeout	Per-request timeout
MaxCachedSchemas	In-memory schema cache size

Circuit breaker options

Circuit breaker configuration is covered in detail on the error policies page. The short form:

group.CircuitBreaker(cb =>
{
    cb.FailureThreshold(5);
    cb.SamplingWindow(TimeSpan.FromSeconds(60));
    cb.PauseDuration(TimeSpan.FromSeconds(30));
    cb.TripOn<HttpRequestException>(); // optional; default trips on any exception
});

Dead letter options

Dead letter configuration is covered on the error policies page. The short form:

kafka.DeadLetter("orders.dlt");

// With provisioning options:
kafka.DeadLetter("orders.dlt", dlq =>
{
    dlq.Provisioning(options =>
    {
        options.Retention = TimeSpan.FromDays(30);
    });
});

The DLQ topic participates in topic verification and auto-provisioning like any other topic.

Auto-provisioning options

Call kafka.AutoProvision() to enable automatic topic creation at startup. Per-topic creation options are configured via topic.Provisioning(...). See Kafka Setup: Auto-provisioning for usage examples.

Option	Default	Description
NumPartitions	broker default	Number of partitions
ReplicationFactor	broker default	Number of replicas
Retention	7 days	How long messages are retained (null = infinite)
RetentionBytes	no limit	Maximum partition size before old segments are discarded
CleanupPolicy	Delete	Delete, Compact, or DeleteAndCompact
DeleteRetention	1 day	Tombstone retention for compacted topics
CompressionType	Producer	Producer, Uncompressed, Gzip, Snappy, Lz4, or Zstd
MinCleanableDirtyRatio	0.5	Minimum dirty-to-total ratio before compaction
MinCompactionLag	0	Minimum time before compaction
MaxCompactionLag	none	Maximum time before compaction

Leader election options

Controls how Emit elects a leader across instances. Tuning is rarely needed except in high-latency networks or when the default lease duration is too aggressive for your failover requirements.

Option	Default	Description
HeartbeatInterval	15s	How often each node attempts to renew leadership
LeaseDuration	60s	How long a lease lasts; another node takes over if not renewed in time
QueryTimeout	5s	Max time for a heartbeat database query; the node drops leadership on timeout
NodeRegistrationTtl	90s	How long before a silent node is considered dead and removed
InstanceId	MachineName	Human-readable node identifier visible in leader records

emit.ConfigureLeaderElection(le =>
{
    le.HeartbeatInterval = TimeSpan.FromSeconds(10);
    le.LeaseDuration = TimeSpan.FromSeconds(45);
    le.InstanceId = Environment.GetEnvironmentVariable("POD_NAME");
});

Daemon coordination options

Controls how the outbox daemon is assigned to leader nodes.

Option	Default	Description
AcknowledgeTimeout	30s	How long a node has to acknowledge a daemon assignment before the leader reassigns it
DrainTimeout	30s	How long a node has to stop a revoked daemon before the leader force-reassigns it

emit.ConfigureDaemons(d =>
{
    d.AcknowledgeTimeout = TimeSpan.FromSeconds(15);
    d.DrainTimeout = TimeSpan.FromSeconds(20);
});

Lock cleanup options

Applies to the EF Core persistence provider only. Controls how often expired distributed lock rows are purged from the database.

Option	Default	Range	Description
CleanupInterval	5 minutes	min 1 minute	How often the cleanup worker runs

Tracing options

Option	Default	Description
Enabled	true	Master switch for all Emit trace activity
CreateRootActivities	true	Creates a root span when no parent trace context is present
PropagateBaggage	true	Forwards W3C baggage across message boundaries
MaxBaggageSizeBytes	8192	Maximum baggage payload size in bytes (range: 1024-65536)

OpenTelemetry instrumentation options

Option	Default	Description
EnableEmitMeter	true	Core pipeline instruments
EnableOutboxMeter	true	Outbox worker instruments
EnableLockMeter	true	Distributed lock instruments
EnableMediatorMeter	true	Mediator instruments
EnableKafkaMeter	true	Kafka consumer/producer instruments
EnableKafkaBrokerMeter	true	Broker-level Kafka instruments

Call options.EnrichWithTag("key", "value") to add a global dimension to all instruments.

Middleware lifetimes

group.Use<MyMiddleware>(MiddlewareLifetime.Singleton); // default: one shared instance
group.Use<MyMiddleware>(MiddlewareLifetime.Scoped);    // one instance per message

See Custom Middleware for registration details and lifetime semantics.

Validation on startup

All options classes implement IValidateOptions<T> and are registered with ValidateOnStart(). If a required field is missing or a value falls outside its allowed range, the application throws at startup with a descriptive error pointing to the misconfigured option. You will not discover bad configuration at 2am when a message finally exercises that code path.