Creating a Client and Invoking the Web Service

Invoking the web service and utilizing the generated code depends on your development environment; but, for example, it might include the following steps, assuming the web service has already been deployed and tested:

Copy or reference the generated source and class files; e.g. reference in Eclipse;
Code your client; e.g. Java main program. Typically your steps here will include:
- Instantiate the generated stub class;
- Optionally, increase the client timeout threshold (especially for a client that might run first after the application server starts);
- Setup the credentials in the custom SOAP header (see Custom SOAP Headers for more details);
- Call the stub methods to instantiate objects and set their values for passing to the service;
- Invoke the service operation;
- Check the response;
Build and test.

Typically the generated stub code provides a number of options to invoke the web service. Following are some sample code fragments to help illustrate that.

The following fragment calls a service named simpleAdd in class WebServiceTest for which the external tooling generates WebServiceTestStub and related classes:

Figure 1. Sample Web Service Client

final WebServiceTestStub stub =
      new WebServiceTestStub();

    // Set client timeout for slow machines.
    stub._getServiceClient().getOptions().setProperty(
      HTTPConstants.SO_TIMEOUT, new Integer(180000));
    stub._getServiceClient().getOptions().setProperty(
      HTTPConstants.CONNECTION_TIMEOUT, new Integer(180000));

    // test string and primitive data types
    final WebServiceTestStub.SimpleAdd service =
      new WebServiceTestStub.SimpleAdd();
    final int i = 20;
    final int j = 30;
    service.setArgs0(i);
    service.setArgs1(j);

    final WebServiceTestStub.SimpleAddResponse
      simpleAddResponse = stub.simpleAdd(service);
    final long sum = simpleAddResponse.get_return();

Sometimes, while the generated code is convenient, you need a little more control over your client environment. The following example illustrates how you might call an in-only service using a "hand-built" SOAP message, which in this case takes a simple String argument as input:

Figure 2. Sample Web Service Client Using Generated Stub and Custom Code

final TestWSStub stub =
     new TestWSStub();

   // Get client from stub
   ServiceClient client;
   client = stub._getServiceClient();

   /*
    * Define SOAP using string
    */
   final String xml = "  <rem:testString "
     + "xmlns:rem=\"http://remote.testmodel.util.curam\"> "
     + "    <rem:testString>"
     + My test string!
     + "</rem:testString>"
     + "  </rem:testString>";

   final ByteArrayInputStream xmlStream =
     new ByteArrayInputStream(xml.getBytes());
   final StAXBuilder builder = new StAXOMBuilder(xmlStream);
   final OMElement oe = builder.getDocumentElement();

   // Send the message
   client.fireAndForget(oe);  // API for In-Only processing
   Thread.sleep(10000);       // Required for fireAndForget()
   client.cleanupTransport(); // Avoid exhausting connection pool
   client.cleanup();