WebServices Basic Introduction

1. Web Services

2. Introduction to Web Services
Today, companies rely on thousands of different software
applications each with their own role to play in running a business.
These different software applications run on a wide range of different
platforms and operating systems, and they are implemented in
different programming languages. As a result, it is very difficult for
different applications to communicate with one another and share
their resources in a coordinated way.
2

3. Web Service Architecture
3

4. What are Web Services?
 Web services are application components
 Web services communicate using open protocols
 Web services are self-contained and self-describing
 Web services can be used by other applications
 XML is the basis for Web services
4

5. Why Web Services?
Interoperability has highest priority.
 When all major platforms could access the Web using Web browsers, different platforms
could interact. For these platforms to work together, Web applications were developed.
 Web applications are simple applications run on the web. These are built around the
Web browser standards and can mostly be used by any browser on any platform.
Web services take Web applications to the next level.
 Using Web services your application can publish its function or message to the rest of
the world.
 Web services uses XML to code and decode your data and SOAP to transport it using
open protocols.
Web services have two types of uses.
 Reusable application components. Ideally, there will only be one type of each
application component, and anyone can use it in their application.
Connect existing software
 Web services help solve the interoperability problem by giving different applications a
way to link their data.
 Using Web services you can exchange data between different applications and different
platforms.
5

6. The base of WS
◦ The basic Web services platform is XML + HTTP.
◦ The HTTP protocol is the most used Internet protocol.
◦ XML provides a language which can be used between different platforms and
programming languages and still express complex messages and functions.
Web services platform elements
 SOAP (Simple Object Access Protocol)
 WSDL (Web Services Description Language)
6

7. What is SOAP?
The basic Web services platform is XML
plus HTTP.
 SOAP stands for Simple Object Access Protocol
 SOAP is a communication protocol
 SOAP is for communication between applications
 SOAP is a format for sending messages
 SOAP is designed to communicate via Internet
 SOAP is platform independent
 SOAP is language independent
 SOAP is based on XML
 SOAP is simple and extensible
 SOAP allows you to get around firewalls
 SOAP will be developed as a W3C standard
7

8. What is WSDL?
WSDL is an XML-based language for describing Web services and
how to access them.
 WSDL stands for Web Services Description Language
 WSDL is written in XML
 WSDL is an XML document
 WSDL is used to describe Web services
 WSDL is also used to locate Web services
 WSDL is not yet a W3C standard
8

9. How to test a web service?
 As a web service is something that has no user interface, we
can’t interact with it without a special tool. That tool should allow
composing XML requests via its own user interface. Commonly
such user interfaces are text editors where you write your XML
requests and controls for posting requests to the server.
9

10. How to test a web service?
 Project structure. As in every well-established testing activity, I’ve
started with test specification. The main part of a test specification is
test cases divided into test areas. Visual Studio allows structuring
your test project into test suites (the same as test areas in my test
specification) that contain test cases, which can contain test steps,
you can add, modify, delete and change order of every item in the
structure.
 Test cases. Visual Sdudio provides enough convenient tools to
manage and run your test cases, and view result in test requests.
 Load Testing. You can perform Load Testing.
10

11. How to test a web service?
 Automation. But what if your web service contains too many
methods with too many input and output parameters? It may take
several days for each complete test of your web service if your tool
does not provide functionality to automate your testing. You can
automate validation of your web service’s response against you
input. You can automate the output of validation results into a file
(which could be just a text file of HTML depending on your choice).
11

12. Search Widget. Project
Description
 ESRB requires functionality to query their database to generate
search results for a third party web widget.
 Netsoft shall be responsible for the developing a web service to
generate result sets in response to queries from the Clear Spring
widget. The widget shall make requests for rated games by
specifying a keyword. The work performed by Netsoft USA shall
encompass the following items:
• Define the interface for the calls to be made by the widget
• Define the result set format (XML) to be provided in response to widget calls
• Provide a mechanism by which the number of results returned can be attenuated
(limit the number of rows)
12

13. Scope
 URL (subject to change)
http://esrb.org/SearchWidget/services/Search?wsdl (no https
requested)
 Parameters
◦ searchKeyword
 Text to search
◦ maxResultCount
 Maximum number of records to return (e.g. 50 records)
◦ user (subject to change)
 “ESRB_test”
◦ pass (subject to change)
 “ESRB_test”
13

14. Scope
 Return fields
◦ Certificate
 Game certificate number (5 digits)
◦ Title
 Game title (like ‘%[search text]%’ search condition against the
game title and sorted by Rating Release Date)
◦ Rating
 Game rating (short text format), e.g. “E,” “E10+,” “T,” etc.
◦ Platforms
 Comma delimited list of platforms, e.g. “Xbox, Xbox 360,
Playstation 3”
◦ Descriptors
 Comma delimited list of content descriptors, e.g. “Blood and
Gore, Strong Language, Violence”
14

15. ESRB_WS.webtest
15

16. Test Cases
16

17. Result after run
17

18. Altova XML, Data Management,
and Web service tools
18
The Altova MissionKit is an integrated suite of XML, database tools
designed to meet the diverse development and data management
needs of today’s software architects and XML developers.
XMLSpy® 2009 is the industry's best selling XML development
environment. It offers the top XML editor, schema designer, code
generator, file converters, debuggers, profilers, support for XSLT,
XQuery, Office 2007/OOXML, XBRL, WSDL, SOAP, Visual Studio,
Eclipse, & more.
Link of a Flash demo of the SOAP client and SOAP debugger.
http://www.altova.com/videos.asp?type=1&video=soap