SOAP - Simple Object Access Protocol

The W3C definition of Simple Object Access Protocol is:

SOAP is a lightweight XML based Protocol for exchanging information in a decentralized, distributed environment. The use of XML technologies in SOAP define an extensible messaging framework and message constructs for interoperability. The SOAP message is an XML document that consists of:

1. A mandatory SOAP Envelope

2. An optional SOAP Header and

3. A mandatory SOAP Body

A typical SOAP message in an XML document is shown below. SOAP is one of the core standards of web services.

SOAP Message

<?xml version=”1.0” encoding="UTF-8" ?>
<soap:Envelope
 xmlns:soap=”http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/”
 xmlns:xsd=”http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema”  
 xmlns:addr=”http://www.kayshav.com/addr”>
<soap:Body>
<addr:address>
  <addr:name>ABC123 Company</addr:name>
  <addr:street>123 ABC Street</addr:street>
  <addr:city>Anycity</addr:city>
  <addr:state>Anystate</addr:state>
  <addr:postalcode>11111-2222</addr:postalcode>
  <addr:country>Anycountry</addr:country>
</addr:address>
</soap:Body>
</soap:Envelope>

References

1. Web Services Architecture, W3C Working Group Note 11 February 2004.

2. Richard Monson-Haefel, The Ultimate Guide J2EE Web Services, Pearson Education Inc., 2004.

3. Thomas Erl, Service Oriented Architecture, Concepts, Technology and Design, Pearson Education Inc., 2005.

Last Revised on: November 22, 2013