This section describes what is SOAP (Simple Object Accessing Protocol) - A client-server communication protocol to access remote objects.
SOAP (Simple Object Accessing Protocol) - A client-server communication protocol to allow
the client side to accessing programming objects on the server side, and execute methods
against those objects, and receiving execution result. All these functionalities are
archived by sending and receiving XML messages over various transportation protocols,
like TCP, HTTP, FTP, etc.
There are two options for an application program, client side or server side, to use
SOAP:
1. Follow the SOAP protocol, and do everything yourself. Here is the communication diagram:
| SOAP on TCP |
Client Prog.|<-------------->|Server Prog.
Here is the steps involved to complet a single SOAP communication:
Step Client Program Server Program
1 Prepare server socket
2 Listen on server socket
3 Wait
4 Prepare SOAP request Wait
5 Prepare client socket Wait
6 Connect to server Connect with client
7 Transmit SOAP request Receive SOAP request
8 Wait Process SOAP request
9 Wait Prepare SOAP response
10 Receive SOAP response Transmit SOAP response
11 Close client socket Wait
2. Use SOAP client API (Application Program Interface) package to help
your client program to:
Use SOAP technology with a simple API.
Prepare the SOAP request XML message.
Transmit the SOAP request.
Receive the SOAP response.
Parse the SOAP response.
3. Use SOAP server API (Application Program Interface) package to help
your server program to:
Use SOAP technology with a simple API.
Receive the SOAP request XML message.
Parse the SOAP request.
Prepare the SOAP response XML message.
Transmit the SOAP response.
Here is the communication diagram, if you are using SOAP API packages:
Client System Server System
API | TCP/HTTP/... |
Client Prog.<--->SOAP Client|<-------------->|TCP/HTTP/... Server
^
| Attached
v
SOAP Server
^
| API
v
Server Prog.
To learn more about SOAP, see my other book: "Herong's Notes on SOAP".
