Web services provide a way to run a service on the Web and access its methods using standard protocols, including Simple Object Access Protocols (SOAP), Extensible Markup Language (XML), Web Service Description Language (WSDL), and Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP). Technically, a web service is nothing more than an application that exposes its interface to a client who wants to access the service's abilities. The uses of a web service include validating credit cards, searching for data in a database, inserting an order into a shopping cart, and updating a guest list. The sky is the limit on what you can have your web service do on your server. In the past, JavaBeans, ActiveX/Component Object Model (COM) controls, and other nonstandard service components handled these services, which required specialized formats to exchange data with the client. But web services under .NET run by invoking methods in the service directly through HTTP or SOAP, so someone wanting to run your web service from their computer at home can simply send an HTTP call to your service, passing the parameter in a standard Uniform Resource Locator (URL). I'll show you how to do this later in the article. Three attributes make up a Web service: * Discovery: First, you need to locate the Web service. You locate Web service through the Discovery Service Protocol. The *.disco file stores the protocol in your Visual studio (VS) .NET project. This file contains reference to all the Web services under your Web site's virtual directory. VS can automatically generate this file for you. The discovery file (.vsdisco), an XML file, is used to identify searchable paths on the web server used by discovery process.
* Description: Once you have discovered your service, you need a way to tell the client what methods, classes, and so on the web service has and what wiring protocol (SOAP, HTTP, and so on) the services are using. You do this through WSDL, an XML format. VS provide tools for generating WSDL files automatically from your services.
* Wiring Protocol: Web services under .NET use two main protocols, HTTP-post /HTTP-get and SOAP. HTTP-post and HTTP-get enable you to send and receive information via a URL by passing and receiving name value pair strings. Unfortunately, HTTP can only pass strings that represent different data types. SOAP allows you to pass a richer type of information, such as datasets.
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* Description: Once you have discovered your service, you need a way to tell the client what methods, classes, and so on the web service has and what wiring protocol (SOAP, HTTP, and so on) the services are using. You do this through WSDL, an XML format. VS provide tools for generating WSDL files automatically from your services.
* Wiring Protocol: Web services under .NET use two main protocols, HTTP-post /HTTP-get and SOAP. HTTP-post and HTTP-get enable you to send and receive information via a URL by passing and receiving name value pair strings. Unfortunately, HTTP can only pass strings that represent different data types. SOAP allows you to pass a richer type of information, such as datasets.
Read more: C# corner