A private web service???

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jeffrydell
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A private web service???

Post by jeffrydell »

I've been reading up on XML-RPC, SOAP, UDDI, and WSDL to get background for a project which may not be a full-blown "Web Service". I'd like to be able to offer access to data in my db to paid clients who have websites and would like to display info that I have collected. I don't want access to be available to anyone who happens to "find" my application - just to people that I license.

It appears that I can 'get the job done' with an XML-RPC routine and an XSLT routine to format the results appropriately on the client's page. The question is DO I NEED a WSDL document or UDDI if I'm not making this project available to the general public? It seems to me that UDDI and WSDL are only for helping 'outsiders' grab data from a Web Service if the service being offered is 'open' to the whole world. Am I correct - or am I missing something?

Thanks for your help!
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VirtuosiMedia
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Re: A private web service???

Post by VirtuosiMedia »

jeffrydell wrote:I've been reading up on XML-RPC, SOAP, UDDI, and WSDL to get background for a project which may not be a full-blown "Web Service". I'd like to be able to offer access to data in my db to paid clients who have websites and would like to display info that I have collected. I don't want access to be available to anyone who happens to "find" my application - just to people that I license.

It appears that I can 'get the job done' with an XML-RPC routine and an XSLT routine to format the results appropriately on the client's page. The question is DO I NEED a WSDL document or UDDI if I'm not making this project available to the general public? It seems to me that UDDI and WSDL are only for helping 'outsiders' grab data from a Web Service if the service being offered is 'open' to the whole world. Am I correct - or am I missing something?

Thanks for your help!
It's been a little while since I've read up on web services, but I think you can have authentication tokens with most of those.
josh
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Re: A private web service???

Post by josh »

Some soap clients could require a wsdl to be present, others may not. It just describes your service, as long as the client can still make the request the wsdl file is not necessarily "needed"

... however if your service is going to be extended it can automate updating the client side, using a wsdl to php tool
jeffrydell
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Re: A private web service???

Post by jeffrydell »

jshpro2 wrote:Some soap clients could require a wsdl to be present, others may not.
This is so basic I may not even go the SOAP route - this could just be an XML-RPC project. In fact, I'm really leaning that way as the entire scope is "client site requests records based on the client's ID, the query is stored in a client record - return the query results ... then XSLT makes it show up on the client's web page." That's the whole mission.

The only thing at all 'fancy' about this is identifying the client and ensuring the request is coming from their server. I think that can be done XML-RPC, don't believe I need SOAP, UDDI, or WSDL.
... however if your service is going to be extended it can automate updating the client side, using a wsdl to php tool
You are right there ... future growth should be a consideration and I'm not done 'dreaming' before I start coding & implementing. So that consideration remains on the note pad.

Thanks!

Jeff
josh
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Re: A private web service???

Post by josh »

You could theoretically do it in CSV, or just pass a comma delimited list of parameters and explode them on the other end. I would recommend at minimum implementing at least full XML parsing though. Infact its already been done for you http://www.php.net/simplexml
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