Mark Secrist

Developers are beginning to develop more sophisticated Web services, exchanging complex XML documents rather than simple parameter types. As this shift takes place, development teams begin to grapple with different approaches to designing these Web services interfaces through the use of WSDL. As we've worked with a number of these teams, we've begun to discover some important best practices that can be applied, particularly in the use of XML Schemas in a Web services design. In this article, we will focus on four specific areas: XML Schema style, namespaces, XML and WSDL import for modularity, and use of schema types for platform interoperability. Through the use of these techniques, you will be able to achieve a higher degree of portability of your WSDL and XML Schemas ... (more)

A Strategy for Securing Web Services

Security is not a new concern for companies that want to protect key information and systems from unauthorized access. Protection from such attacks has traditionally been achieved by placing those systems in a tightly controlled intranet accessed through a hardware firewall, possibly over secure TCP/IP connections. However, as more information and functionality are made available over th... (more)

PORTALIZE IT!

In recent years, Web portals have risen in popularity as a way of aggregating, organizing, and presenting content in a highly uniform, customizable, and personalized way. As the technologies that enable the creation and management of these Web portals have evolved, it is not only information content that is being offered, but application functionality as well. With application functiona... (more)