eZ soap is a library for SOAP communication. It handles both client and server side functionality. eZ xml is used to handle XML manipulations in eZ soap.

Definition of SOAP, from the W3C spec:

SOAP is a lightweight protocol for exchange of information in a decentralized, distributed environment. It is an XML based protocol that consists of three parts: an envelope that defines a framework for describing what is in a message and how to process it, a set of encoding rules for expressing instances of application-defined data types, and a convention for representing remote procedure calls and responses.

eZ soap follows the SOAP Version 1.2 standard. Read the Messaging framework specification for details about messaging with SOAP.

SOAP usage

eZ soap can be used for distributed computing. It's platform and language independent.
The basis of SOAP is to exchange XML encoded information, using XML namespaces and schemas.
SOAP can be used in two different ways, either sending a custom XML document or as a RPC
(Remote Procedure Call) protocol. eZ soap? focuses on the latter.

SOAP messages

Every SOAP message contains the following elements, SOAP Envelope, Body and an optional Header. The SOAP
message below shows a simple "Hello World!" request. eZ soap provides a simple, yet powerful,
interface to SOAP communication.

<?xml version="1.0"?>

<SOAP-ENV:Envelope

        xmlns:SOAP-ENV="http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/"

        xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"

        xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema"

        xmlns:SOAP-ENC="http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/encoding/">

 <SOAP-ENV:Body xmlns:req="http://soapinterop.org/">

   <req:helloWorld />

 </SOAP-ENV:Body>

</SOAP-ENV:Envelope>

Useful links

• W3C
• WSDL spec
• SOAPBuilders Interoperability Lab
• XML Protocol Abstract Model
• Apache AXIS SOAP library (Java)