----- Original Message -----
Sent: Wednesday, August 22, 2001 8:57
AM
Subject: RE: SOAP usage in the real
world
> Q: Do any of the current crop of WSDL tools generate
serializable client-side
> java classes for the datatypes
declared in the <types> section?
Yes, the WSDL.EXE tool in Microsoft .NET beta 2.
-----Original Message-----
From: Peter
Tandara-Kuhns [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
Sent: 21 August 2001 18:19
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; David
Wall
Subject: RE: SOAP usage in the real world
I don't have the answers to these questions, but having
implemented demo's
using the IBM and Microsoft (MS
SOAP Toolkit 2.0, not .NET) WSDL tools, I
have
some observations that the folks writing the tools
could clarify.
The IBM WSDL tools are dependent on Apache SOAP, and the focus
seems have
been
on getting
Apache SOAP solid before coming out with new versions of the WSDL
tools (BTW, the Apache SOAPers have done a fantastic job in
that regard).
The WSDL toolkit I used didn't support
user-defined complex datatypes.
The latest toolkit,
WSIF, does seem to support complex types, based on the
addressbook WSDL sample.
My demos all used primative datatypes. Since the interop
issues for simple
datatypes seem to have been overcome
(resolved?) has anyone got interop
working
for complex data? I haven't tried yet, but will
soon.
The WSTK toolkit generates WSDL and deployment descriptor
mappings from java
classes that implement the
JavaBeans API.
Q: If the java class uses an Object as
a parameter, does WSDL generation
fail?
On the (Apache) server side, you can map complex data to
whatever java class
you want using the deployment descriptor, and it is up to the
serializer and
desrializer to "do the right thing". If you are using
java on the client,
I would think that a "data-only"
class would be preferable to exporting the
actual Java
class you are mapping the data to.
Q: Do any of the current crop of WSDL tools generate
serializable
client-side
java
classes for the datatypes declared in the <types> section?
-----Original Message-----
From: David
Wall [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
Sent: Tuesday, August 21, 2001 11:30 AM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: SOAP
usage in the real world
I like the concept around SOAP, but I'm wondering if there are
any "real
world" uses of it for web services beyond
perhaps the intranet. If so, how
are people
handling:
1) Interoperabliity. Seems like Apache SOAP server don't
work all that well
with most of the MSFT .NET
toolkits, especially for APIs needed or more than
simple tests.
2) Service description. WSDL seems like the way things
are going to
describe services to potential customers,
but Apache SOAP doesn't have plans
to implement it,
and Axis seems still a long way from production with the
features currently in Apache SOAP. How are people letting others
know about
the format of complex data objects,
potentially with attachments, etc.?
3) Object/class sharing. Does anybody provide end-users
with the Java
classes that they use on the server to
return or accept complex data
objects? If so,
did you create special "data only" Java classes for use
with SOAP, since I can't imagine wanting to share the true object
classes
because they probably have huge
dependencies/references to other project
classes that
you may not want to share, have internal logic data elements
that you wouldn't normally share (i.e. the so-called 'transient' fields
that
may exist, like 'lastLoginTime' or what have
you), additional fields that
you might share via the
XML but are perhaps computed in your class logic
(i.e.
a 'total' field or a 'timestamp' that you might want to return as the
Java long value, but also expressed as String date/time
according to the
caller's timezone), have processing
logic that won't make sense except on
the server (i.e.
'saveData' or methods that might interact with other parts
of the your system), etc. It seems like having to create a
separate data
only class hierarchy for use with SOAP's
XML marshallers is perhaps overly
nasty.
What are people doing with this? We have created our XML
APIs around SOAP,
and they tended to work okay in an
all-Apache SOAP world, but things got
much nastier
once the caller was a .NET VB or COM object, and it was hard to
describe the service's method+parameters for complex objects
(objects with
many data elements, optional fields,
embedded lists/arrays, references to
other potentially
complex objects), and we did need a separate "data object"
that expressed our objects in a more portable format (i.e.
java.sql.Timestamp was shown as both a long and a String
defined in GMT).
Thanks for any advice on what successful, complext
implementations are doing
with respect to such
issues,
David
Yozons Inc. -
Secure Delivery and E-Signatures for everyone
www.yozons.com
