W3C | Submissions

Team Comment on the SOAP over Java Message Service 1.0 (SOAP-JMS) Submission

W3C is pleased to receive the Java Message Service 1.0 (SOAP-JMS) Submission from BEA Systems Inc., International Business Machines Corporation, Progress Software, TIBCO Software Inc., Software AG, and WSO2.

This Submission defines a SOAP 1.2 binding to Java Message Service (JMS). It also defines how SOAP 1.1 binds to JMS, as well as way to describe its use in WSDL 1.1 and WSDL 2.0.

SOAP Bindings

A SOAP binding represent the set of rules defining how the Infoset of a SOAP message is transmitted over a particular protocol, the way to handle potential failures, and the requirements for building a conformant implementation of the binding. Bindings are usually defining direct mapping to an underlying transport, like the SOAP 1.2 HTTP Binding but it is also possible to define nest-able bindings.

Java Messaging System

JMS is a set of APIs used to create and transmit messages in Messaging Systems. Being an API, it does not define a wire format, nor provide on the wire compatibility between different vendors implementations of this set of APIs.

SOAP-JMS

As one of the principal characteristic of SOAP is to provide message level interoperability between different implementation and different programming languages. By using SOAP in JMS, it becomes easier to bridge different customers using different JMS providers. It is important to note that the specification does not define a wire format, or provide direct integration of different JMS implementation.

The current specification is quite complete and defines the SOAP binding in accordance with the rules defined in the SOAP Binding Framework. A few references are to old documents, and the impact on the specification of updating those reference needs to be fully analyzed.

Next steps

It is possible that, at some point in the future, W3C will charter a WOrking Group to define extensions to SOAP like new SOAP bindings. If this happens, this submission will have to be taken into account, either to extend the scope of an existing Working Group, or for the creation of a new one.

Yves Lafon