Web Services Overview

Created Feb. 7, 2024 by Karim Zaveri

Overview

With the increase in the development of component based programming and software applications, many organizations have come to realize that there is a strong need to have an industry standard for easy exchange of data between software applications.  Industry collaboration in this effort brought about Web Services.  Web service is a method of communication that allows two software systems to exchange their data over the internet.  Web services allow for business-to-business (B-to-B) or Machine-to-Machine (M2M) transactions between organizations. There are two popular types of web services: SOAP and RESTful.

This reusable learning object (RLO) provides an overview of the Web Services, its historical background, its architectural components, and describes the two types of web services: SOAP and RESTful.

Audience

This RLO will be useful for readers who are interested to learn the basics of web services and implement them in practice.

Prerequisite knowledge

The prerequisite knowledge that is required by the audience is listed below:

  • Basic understanding and knowledge of eXtensible Markup Language (XML) and XML namespaces
  • Basic understanding of HTTP concepts and its various methods (GET, PUT, etc.)
  • Basic understanding of object oriented programming concept
  • Understanding of object oriented programming languages, like C++, Java, ASP.NET

Learning objective

Following are the learning objectives of this RLO:

  • Understand the concept behind Web Services and the benefits of its use
  • Understand and describe Web Services architecture and its components
  • Understand and describe the two types of Web Services and their differences: SOAP and RESTful
  • Understand the components of WSDL and SOAP message
  • Create and deploy a simple Web service and Web service client using Glassfish or Eclipse

PowerPoint Presentation

The powerpoint presentation provides an introduction and overview of the Web Services.  The presentation describes the following items:

§  History

§  Benefits of using Web Services

§  Web Service components

§  UDDI (Universal Description, Discovery and Integration)

§  SOAP (Simple Object Access Protocol)

§  SOAP Elements

§  SOAP Examples

§  WSDL (Web Services Description Language)

§  Web Services process

§  Big Web Services

§  RESTful Web Services

§  JSON-PRC

§  Web Service specifications

§  References

The presentation includes diagrams and illustrations to describe the Web Services architecture and its components.

Download: Web Services presentation_1.pptx


Web Services Web page links

Web pages document which includes various webpage links with short descriptions to provide further learning regarding Web Services.  The links include tutorials to guide the student on how to build a client and a server web services as well as exercise and quizzes to test and challenge the student regarding what they have learned.

Download: Web Services Overview web links_1.docx


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