Asynchronous Web

Services

Jaliya N. Ekanayake
Basics of Web Services
Simple Web Service Invocations

 Example of Synchronous Service Invocation.

 Service takes some time to complete
 Client is waiting for the response

 Example of Asynchronous Service Invocation

 Service takes some time to complete
 Client is waiting for the response
Some Use Cases
 Time consuming web services
 long-lived operations
 batch processing

 peer to peer programs

 event driven application models.

 Web services that leverage The client can be a Reactive

Application
 Client can be a server to some other clients. So the blocking
is not acceptable.
Some Use Cases contd..

 User may not need to wait for the responses

 User is doing some batch submission.
 E.g. A bank submitting credit card information to a service
provider.
 User can check for responses after sending few invocations.
 The response from a service represents a collective information.
 User need the response after some time.
 E.g. A batch submission process, the result will be available in
the next day.
Supporting the Asynchrony

 Protocol level asynchrony

 E.g. JMS can be used to invoke the services asynchronously.
 Client subscribes to a topic and return

 Response will be delivered to client through the JMS Queue

 Client Asynchrony Patterns

 Fire and Forget
 Callbacks
 Polling
 Service Asynchrony
Client Side Asynchrony
 Fire and Forget.
 Invokes the service and return immediately without ever bothering about a response.

Client Machine Server

1 Invoke 2 Send
Client
Client Proxy Service
3 Return
 Issues
 No waiting. Client can immediately resume the thread.
 Easy for the developers
 Loosely coupled
 No way to verify whether the request has been sent or not.
Fire and Forget
 Code Snippet

 Example>>
Client Side Asynchrony
 Polling
 Client repeatedly poll for the availability of the results, while performing some other task.

Client Machine Server

1 Invoke 2 Send
Client
Client
Proxy Service
3 Return
a Poll Object
Polling and
getting back Poll Object
 Issues
the result Set the Response
 Client has to wait polling
 Client has to handle the complexity of this polling operation
 Response can be retrieved asynchronously
Polling
 Code Snippet

 Example>>
Client Side Asynchrony
 Result Callbacks
 Client provides a callback method. Proxy will dispatch the result using the
callback method.

Client Machine Server

2 Invoke 3 Send
Client
Client
Proxy Service

1 Creates a
Callback Callback
Object 4 Response is dispatched
to the callback by the client proxy
 Issues
 Client has to provide the callback method
 Client has to handle the additional complexity
 Response can be retrieved asynchronously
Callback
 Code Snippet

 Example>>
Asynchronous Web Service Model
 The service does not “return” anything.
 It can send the response (if any) by itself.
 Transport may or may not be synchronous
 E.g. 1 (HTTP Transport)
 Service has a void return type and it will send a response after a while using different

HTTP connection
 E.g. 2 (One way transport -JMS)
 Service sends a response using a new one way transport.

 What is required.
 Service should have the capability to send the response by itself.
 Client should be able to correlate the request and the response
 Client should have an addressable endpoint.

 Can use WS-Addressing <wsa:relatesTo> for standard correlation.

 Asynchronous Web Service Model contd..
 The model

Sender M
Service

Receiver M

Client

 Features
 Service sends the response by itself.
 Correlation information contains in the SOAP message itself.
 Client has both a Sender and a Receiver.
Support from the Existing Technologies
 Microsoft .NET supports the client side asynchrony.
 With the WSE 2.0 the service asynchrony is also supported.
 Systinet WASP supports the client side asynchrony and WS-Addressing.
 Axis 2 (Currently under development) will support both.
Summery
 There are many advantages of using asynchronous patterns in
implementing web services for B2B, EAI scenarios.
 Client Side Asynchrony
 Fire & Forget
 Polling
 Callbacks
 Service Asynchrony
 Technology support
References
 http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dnmaj/html/
aj2mpsoarch.asp
 http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/cpguide/
html/cpconinvokingwebservicesasynchronously.asp
 www.fawcette.com/xmlmag/ 2003_02/magazine/practice/dchappell/
 http://www.c-sharpcorner.com/Code/2004/April/AsyncWebServices.asp
 http://www.esecurityplanet.com/prodser/article.php/2235201
 http://xml.coverpages.org/ni2004-04-15-a.html
Thank You!