Java and Soap [Englisch] [Taschenbuch]

But one thing to know is that the book covers _only_ SOAP. There is one chapter about WSDL and no UDDI.
There is no mention of EJB, JMS, and only a very light introduction to JAX-RPC.
An exemple of how to call a .NET service is given, but no exemple of how to build a service that will be compatible with .NET clients.

But personally, I prefer a book that covers only one subject, but covers it toroughly.

The only thing I found lacking was the coverage of Message style web services. There is only a small 10 pages about the subject.

If you are new to web services, I would recommend buying first a book like Building web services for Java to get a good idea of all pieces, and then this one to get all the details you will need about SOAP when you put your knowledge to work.

Now is there a good book that covers JAX-RPC and JAXM??

This book was very valuable to me as I was working on a project involving web services. I was writing Java code on a platform that would allow for a user to enter a command and get information back from the server. The concept of web services was intriguing as it opened up a large set of possibilities for features I could implement. By using the information in this book, I was able to quickly get up to speed with a functional example that worked. I was then able to fill in gaps in my knowledge and expand my examples to connect with additional sources of data. Without the information in this book, it would have taken me a whole lot longer to figure it all out.

For Notes/Domino 5 developers, you may not see a use for this information (at least at this level of detail) at this time. It's possible that you may want to write a Java agent for a Notes application that uses SOAP to get some data from a web service. I would encourage you to try that if possible. This would be much more applicable for someone who has started working with Websphere and is trying to build or consume web services. In my case, I was using it to allow Sametime to interact with web services. Some very cool stuff...

Conclusion
If you're ready to branch out into the world of web services and want to write and/or use one, you should seriously consider getting this book. If you work through the examples and material, I am confident that you will end up being very successful in getting results in a short time frame.

Why you should read this book -
Whether you are writing a new SOAP service or simply using an existing one, understanding what happens under the bonnet helps make your system more robust.

What this book covers -
This book covers almost everything you have to know about how Java supports the technology - core APIs, SOAP encoding, structure of SOAP messages, attachments, platform interoperability issues and some nice guidelines. It also includes some getting-started examples with two different SOAP servers- Apache and GLUE ? to help the reader understand how SOAP implementation differs. There is some introductory material covering JAX-RPC, JAXM, Apache Axis and WSDL. The chapters are well organized although the writing lacks reader-friendly approach.

Cons -
The book came out in May 2002 and hence a few things are out of date including SOAP spec and Apache implementation. Examples seem rather trivial and lack depth. Advanced SOAP programmers or those considering enterprise integration will be disappointed. Coverage on .NET interoperability is a far cry from even being introductory. I hope the next version of the book will adequately address real integration issues such as performance, transactions, and security.

Ajith Kallambella
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