Base Web Service Protocols Updated

A key standards body has concluded that one of the two message formats used by Web services poses insurmountable problems and should be dropped. The recommendation comes in a recent draft specification from the Web Services Interoperability Organization (WS-I), an industry consortium led by Microsoft and IBM that is developing and promoting Web services technology as a way to integrate applications across programming languages and tools from multiple vendors. Although ASP.NET and Visual Studio .NET (VS.NET) support both message formats, several Microsoft products and tools rely on the soon-to-be obsolete format and will need to be updated to ensure future interoperability. The fact that some of the base Web service protocols are still being changed highlights the developing nature of the technology.

WS-I Aims for Interoperability

WS-I was formed to help ensure that Web services can interoperate with each other regardless of the operating system they use and the programming language and tools used to develop them. Such interoperability is part of the reason Web services exist; without it they are nothing more than an interesting sideshow. (For more information on WS-I, see “GXA Defines Framework for Web Services” on page 11 of the Oct. 2002 Update.)