The internal functionality of middleware is highly variable and thus, well-constructed integrations are difficult to perform without understanding the architectural style of the middleware and the adaptive connections needed make components in an application integration “middleware-aware.” In this paper, we use IBM’s WebSphere® MQ to implement two different architectural styles of integration: request/reply and publish/subscribe. The middleware supports both approaches by using different configurations of controlling, routing, and translating functionality within the connectors. By explicitly describing the component connectors attached to the middleware, we discuss the trade-offs that exist between centralized solutions in which the middleware is responsible for the majority of the integration functionality and localized solutions, in which application connectors are responsible for integration to the largest extent possible.