Forum OpenACS Q&A: Re: SOAP Gateway Package ready

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Posted by Dan Wickstrom on
William, this looks nice.

This package seems to be configured only for supporting the server end of a soap connection, and I don't see how one goes about generating the client stubs needed for invoking a service?  Are there some utilities for generating the client stubs, or do I need to do this part manually?  I haven't looked through the whole package, so I may be missing it.

Does the IDL only support basic types like int, float, string, etc?  If so, how difficult would it be to extend the IDL to support more complex types?

Overall, the package looks to be very nicely done.

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Posted by William Byrne on
<blockquote>>Are there some utilities for generating the client stubs
</blockquote>
You bet, there are plenty. From within SG, go to Help and navigate to the references section where I list a few. The SG package also includes client demos for MSSOAP Toolkit and AXIS which is a java based solution. You'll find them under 'Tests'. I'm waiting for Don Baccus to chime in and make reference to TclSOAP<g>. As he's correctly pointed out, it's a viable solution for thing related to tcl and soap. As far as client stuff goes in SG, I thought about it. Something will eventually surface. I must admin, all client connectivity was performed from a win32 box (hmmmm, testing interoperability to my linux server from win32 - pretty cool.) Server to server connectivity would probably be helpful for scaled implementations. Despite a potential SG client solution, I'd encourage other types of client implementations since that's what SOAP's all about.

Concerning complex types, I'll be handling that within the near future. I've been through complex types in other SOAP services I manage; therefore, I'm not concerned about its complexity.

Thanks for the compliments. I hope the package provides the connectivity we're hoping for. My personal goal was to get automated access to the ecommerce package. I'm looking forward to getting there.