new to SOAP

[Edy Yu]

We are building a client-server program.
Basicly, the server will talk to the backend database and generate some string results. The situation is the client want to get the results in XML format. To my rudimentary knowledge of SOAP, I proposed SOAP as the implementing mechanism over CORBA and RMI.
My question is, do we need a web server to support SOAP? As we current prototyped using Apaches SOAP, there has to be a servlet called RequestRouter (or something like that) registered in a web server to route the HttpRequest to my server.
By the way, I am still not sure if my proposal is an approperiate one.
Thanks.

[Joe Gilvary]

You need some kind of server to support SOAP.
SOAP is something like RMI, in that it allows
you to invoke methods on foreign objects (objects in a different memory space).
SOAP does not, by itself, include the low level
protocol for transporting the message. SOAP is
usually implemented on top of HTTP (thus, the
web server) but the documentation at w3c.org
includes mention of building SOAP on top of
mail. Sorry that I cannot be more specific about
that reference right now. I am bandwidth
constrained :< from here.
As for whether SOAP is the right choice for your
project, a lot depends on what languages you use
on each end, what skill set you have available
for development, maintenance, etc.
HTH,
Joe

[William Brogden]

As Joe says, there are a lot of ways to move SOAP messages around. Does your client want to move the XML over the Internet or is it a private network?
I have a couple of chapters on non-HTTP message transport in the book. You can use eMail, Message Oriented Middleware, JavaSpaces. I even heard of one system using FTP for transport.
Bill

[Fei Ng]

Bill,
I am pretty new to XML and SOAP.
About moving SOAP messages around, it seems XML
and SOAP work togather all the time. Does that
always the case? For HTTP message i am pretty sure thats the case. How about non-HTTP messages using SOAP? For using FTP for transport, is SOAP and XML still the best answer?
Oh yeah, does your book talk about SOAP on Web Services in general? Can't wait to get my hand
on it.(going b&n tomorrow)
Congratulations!!
Book of the Week in BunkHouse.

John