Re: Big-Picture Question (Web Services, RegNow)

Hi,

Jonathan Wood wrote:
Laurent,

That works fine for me. Here is the code I used to test. I created a web service, and a .NET application. In the .NET application, I added a web reference to the said web service.

Okay, I appreciate that. So that will work. However, again, I want to make sure I'm compatible with as many consumers as possible (.NET or otherwise). My concern is that since the VS IDE is unable to test the service with a structure argument, that there is something somewhat non-standard about that. Since the gain from using a class is minimal, it may not be worth taking that route for me.

SOAP encoding and decoding is really in the responsibility of the client. That said, SOAP is an acknowledged standard now, and more and more platforms will support it. SOAP was a problem for JavaScript in the past, because there was no satisfying engine (the terrible HTC component released by Microsoft was causing huge memory leaks) to handle SOAP encoding and decoding, but now you have ASP.NET AJAX (ex ATLAS) to do that, so it's all good.

Additionally, classes (or arrays) are easy to handle in SOAP, so as long as your properties are simple types, it's really OK to "pack" them.

Jumping ahead, the next items I'm wondering about have to do with deployment of the service. Although I'm somewhat mystified that the default is to deploy Web pages uncompiled, my understanding is that they can be precompiled. So there are a few issues I'm starting to wonder about. Any input you might have would be appreciated.

1. How can I precompile a Web service before placing it on the Web.

When you use the VS2005 website model, you can publish your web service just like you publish a website, by using the menu "Build / Publish". It's the same process, exactly.

However, I recommend you to switch to the Web Application Projet, which is an add-on to Visual Studio and which allows you to develop your websites like you did in VS2003, with total control on the DLL.

http://webproject.scottgu.com/

After installing, choose "New project", and then "Web" and then "ASP.NET Web Service Application".

2. What does a Web service compile to, and when would something like this be compiled to a DLL rather than other types of pages?

A web service is made of a front-end file (.ASMX), which is the entry point, and code-behind (C#). The compilation model is exactly the same as for ASPX pages: The code behind gets compiled in the DLL, additional referenced DLLs get copied too, and the ASMX file remains as a text file.

3. And where would I typically upload the compiled file to (which folder).

You don't have a choice: Except by tweaking the configuration (which I wouldn't), the DLLs must be placed in the "bin" folder under the root of your virtual folder.

Try publishing your web service to a local folder, and then you'll see that the folders are created, and the files copied.

Thanks!

HTH,
Laurent
--
Laurent Bugnion, GalaSoft
Software engineering: http://www.galasoft-LB.ch
Private/Malaysia: http://mypage.bluewin.ch/lbugnion
Support children in Calcutta: http://www.calcutta-espoir.ch
.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Big-Picture Question (Web Services, RegNow)
    ... When you use the VS2005 website model, you can publish your web service ... with total control on the DLL. ... The compilation model is exactly the same as ... the DLLs must be placed in the "bin" folder under the root of ...
    (microsoft.public.dotnet.framework.aspnet)
  • Re: Web Services and COBOL (Fairly long post, but I dont have time to write a proper article on it)
    ... Web Service is a great prerequisite for automated client-side code ... generation in the mainstream Java and .NET SOAP frameworks. ... $set Repository Update ... 000464 12 objSOAPClient OBJECT REFERENCE. ...
    (comp.lang.cobol)
  • RE: Web service issue
    ... We use XML serialization (from the .net ... If you need to populate fields with a default value and you're using SOAP, ... | Thread-Topic: Web service issue ... |> I've basically got an orchestration that is exposes a port as a web ...
    (microsoft.public.biztalk.general)
  • Re: Consuming Web Service without Web Reference
    ... Eventhough I extracted schema from WSDL iam not able to call the web service. ... calling a web service than creating an xml and pushing it to the SOAP adapter. ... still have to generate a proxy and configure it in your send port. ...
    (microsoft.public.biztalk.general)
  • Re: Writing a simple webservice
    ... Yes, SOAP is the successor to XML-RPC, and like XML-RPC it returns ... I'm saying if you want to invoke functions on a web service you ... Public Sub SaveProgrammer(programmer as Programmer) ...
    (microsoft.public.dotnet.languages.vb)