Access to web services

#The present invention relates to provision of web services and more particularly to facilitating client access to such services.

#Over recent years it has become commonplace for a business to provide a web site on the Internet which, for example, enables a web client to purchase goods from the business over the world wide web. Following on from this success it has more recently become a requirement to handle more complex e-business applications on the Internet which, for example, enable business to business communication and this requirement has been satisfied by the arrival of Web services. Web services are modular and enhanced e-business applications that enable programmatic interaction between applications across the Internet. Based on shared, open, and emerging technology standards and protocols, such as SOAP (Simple Object Access Protocol), UDDI (Universal Description, Discovery and Integration), and WSDL (Web Service Definition Language), Web services can communicate, interact, and integrate with heterogeneous applications, irrespective of their implementation formats. Web services can interact with one another across the Internet to facilitate dynamic integration between businesses, suppliers, partners, and customers.

#For example, a web service which provides an e-business application publishes its URL in a well known UDDI directory. A client can then obtain the URL from the UDDI registry and contact the e-business using the URL in order to obtain a WSDL document. The WSDL describes the interface provided for clients by the service e-business application, one or more transport mechanisms, for example SOAP over HTTP, (HyperText Transport Protocol) and an end point address for each transport mechanism. Once a client has the WSDL it can invoke the interface via the specified end point using the specified transport mechanism. Further if the client has a e-business application with which the service e-business application may wish to communicate the client and service may exchanges WSDL documents in order to make this possible.

#The invention will now be described, by way of example only, with reference to a preferred embodiment thereof, as illustrated in the accompanying drawings, in which:

#FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram of a data processing environment in which the preferred embodiment of the present invention can be advantageously applied;

#FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram of a client accessing a target service according to the prior art;

#Note that in the figures like numbers are used to denote like parts.

#FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a data processing environment in which the preferred embodiment of the present invention can be advantageously applied; In FIG. 1, a client/server data processing host 10 is connected to other client/server data processing host 12 and 13 via a network 11, which could be, for example, the Internet. For example a client program could be executing on host 10 which is accessing a target service on host 12 via a gateway server on host 13. Client/server 10 has a processor 101 for executing programs that control the operation of the client/server 10, a RAM volatile memory element 102, a non-volatile memory 103, and a network connector 104 for use in interfacing with the network 11 for communication with the other client/servers 12 and 13.

#FIGS. 2 and 3 are schematic diagrams which show examples of a client accessing a target service according to the prior art and the preferred embodiment of the present invention respectively. Note that the examples consider a simple target service which is a Time service with a single operation. This is for illustrative purposes only and in practice the target services are likely to be more complex. Further note that the preferred embodiment is described in terms of the target service providing a description of its interface and bindings in a WSDL document. However in practice this could be achieved in any document format which can be read and understood by a client and could, for example be XML. Further the WSDL document is made available via a UDDI directory. However in practice this could be via any source known to both the target service and client and which enables the required exchange of information. It could, for example, be a Naming or Directory service.