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What is web service
With the spurt in distributed computing, the Internet is
heading towards Services Oriented Technologies and web service has become
the buzzword of today. Web Services offer easy and standardized communication
for loosely coupled and dynamically discovered software components over
the Internet. Enterprises have started experimenting with Web Services
at their corporate intranets before actually going live to their customers
over the web.
Web service is an evolving technology, which enables businesses
to encapsulate their processes and exchange information across and beyond
their enterprise. Integrating new innovations and applications demands
massive expenditure. However, the advent of web services has brought about
a revolution in the integration of various applications through protocols
like SOAP, UDDI etc. Web service is based on the already existing and
well-known HTTP protocol using XML as the base language, thereby, making
it a very developer-friendly service system. However, most of the technologies
such as RMI, COM, and CORBA involve a whole new challenging learning curve.
In the business world, web service provides a mechanism of communication
between two remote systems, connected through the network of the Web Services.
For example, in case of a merger or an acquisition, companies
don't have to invest large sums of money developing software to bring
the systems of the different companies together. By extending the business
applications as Web Services, the information systems of different companies
can be linked. Using simple SOAP messages over the normal HTTP Web protocol
these business systems can be accessed.
A manufacturing company, for example, requires some raw materials
to be supplied whenever the material in stock reaches the threshold levels.
These levels can be constantly monitored by the business system of a trusted
supplier, and promptly replenished, without having to wait for a supervisor
to notice it and generate a work order.
SOAP (Simple Object Access Protocol) is the method by which
messages can be sent across different modules. This is similar to communication
with the search engine that contains an index with the Websites registered
in the index associated with the keywords. UDDI (Universal Description,
Discovery, and Integration) is the global look up base for locating the
services. This is analogous to the index service for the search engine,
in which all the websites register themselves associated with their keywords.
WSDL (Web Services Definition Language) is the method through which different
services are described in the UDDI.
Thus web service allows an organization to easily integrate
all its applications and enables effective communication across different
system components, including operating systems. Unlike other e-business
and distributed technologies, Web services are platform independent and
promote interoperability among technologies. Thus, by deploying a Web
service platform, companies can directly integrate and share applications
internally and externally.
This article describes the significance of Web service and
discusses the factors that are driving its adoption in a business system.
Though the main idea behind web service is integration and distribution,
they have many other uses in the business world. Web service means more
than just trying applications together. It is like saying 'Yes' to new
business opportunities that have never been considered before. Web services
are growing fast into becoming the most important part of web development
by helping cyber companies to conceive, design and use web applications.
In fact web services help choose web applications. According
to IBM, Web services are self contained, self-describing applications
that can be published and invoked across the web. Right from simple single
transaction processes to full-fledged complicated business processes,
all these can be performed by web service. In reality, Web service can
be called a form of self-describing Web applications.
When web users request a web application, it can serve them
and also connect with other related web applications, and so that the
users get all the services they require without really having to know
the different applications from different locations, which helped them
to get the business processes completed. As the website progresses from
non interactive ones through interactive websites and finally to back
end driven websites, the concept of web service gains momentum and becomes
a much relied upon web development tool.
Web Services- Tools
The Web businesses realized web applications with which
they build extranets, for private usages and customer support. And with
the advent of ecommerce, the websites became the marketing places for
B2C and B2B for selling products and services. In this stage companies
can utilize many of the web applications without buying them, when the
concept of ASPs (Application Service Providers) is being established.
The ASP concept is now emerging as Web service. Developers
expect that the ASP integration headaches can be minimized if web service
standardize certain operations and make them user friendly. The component
models already in use achieve functions similar to web service. The existing
technologies like COM+, DCOM, RMI, and CORBA are used to develop reusable
components that can be hosted remotely and used in web applications.
But these components are giving a tough time to the developers
during their integration, and the cost of development is also high. Hence
the world of web service has taken roots in the newly found nice and cozy
niche. Web services are nothing but applications with programmatic interface
using certain standards and Internet - friendly protocols. Since human
intervention is minimized in Web service development, standards form the
base.
Using different standard protocols web services, which is
an evolving technology and platform independent, help businesses choose
web applications and create sophisticated web service tools that integrate
many features and content. Web services (applications) can communicate
with others without platform hassles. A Web service developed in Java
in a sun environment can communicate easily with another running in a
.NET environment. If applications can be integrated easily in this manner,
there are high possibilities of minimizing the integration cost. Web service
can run right where it is since they are XML based, unlike COM or Bean
components. The market for the commercial web service should be in needy
areas.
An online book selling company can create a stock Web service
that can be used as its reseller applications. The new connectivity standards
SOAP, UDDI & WSDL and the matured standards XML and HTTP, web service
can be created, implemented and can interact with other web services dynamically.
XML - The ideas behind Web service starts with XML. The
eXtensible Markup Language XML forms the backbone of the Web service to
create and implement. Being a markup language like HTML, XML has been
designed to describe data. However, unlike HTML, XML tags are not predefined
in XML. XML is self-describing and uses a Document Type Definition (DTD)
to formally describe the data. XML has been derived from a Structured
Generalized Markup Language (SGML) parent. Hyper Text Markup Language
(HTML) is said to be earlier cousin of XML. XML is a standard agreed upon
worldwide.
UDDI - The UDDI (Universal Description, Discovery, and Integration)
Project is an effort to define a set of specifications that will make
it easier for businesses to accelerate the use of B2B and commerce over
the Internet. The UDDI Project is based on the existing Internet standards
and is platform independent. IT architects should read through the UDDI
specifications and start thinking about which Web Services one's company
should define and publish in the UDDI Business Registry. SOAP is accepted
and supported by IBM, Microsoft, Intel, SUN, Netscape, AT & T and HP.
WSDL - Web Services Description Language is a document written in XML.
and describes a Web service. The evolving technology of platform independent,
web services and web service tools that help choose web applications for
different companies has been offered by Excellone Web Solutions Development
Company, India.
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