Web services discovery

WSDL documents associated with a Provider mode web service are automatically published to the Web.

A convention exists among web service hosting environments that allows the WSDL for a web service to be queried by a remote client (typically an Application Developer using a web browser) using the URI for the web service suffixed with ?wsdl. This convention can make it easier to distribute WSDL to interested parties without the need for a formal WSDL repository. This convention is implemented in CICS®.

For example, you might have a web service hosted in CICS and published under the following URI:

http://www.example.org:1234/example/WebService

The associated WSDL document could be recovered by requesting the following URI using a web browser:

http://www.example.org:1234/example/WebService?wsdl

WSDL documents for service providers can be published for discovery using URIMAP resources. When you install each PIPELINE resource, CICS scans the directory specified in the WSDIR attribute of the PIPELINE resource (the pickup directory). If this directory contains either a WSDL archive file or WSDL document, a second URIMAP resource is installed. This new URIMAP resource provides CICS with the information to associate the WSDL archive file or a WSDL document with a specific URI so that external requesters can use the URI to discover the WSDL archive file or WSDL document. This URI has the same path as the URI associated with the WEBSERVICE with the suffix ?wsdl appended.

The WSDL archive file can contain one or more WSDL documents. If the pickup directory contains a WSDL archive file and a WSDL document, the URI returns only the WSDL archive. The archive file format that is supported is the .zip file type. It is also possible to discover the WSDL archive file or WSDL document using SPI and CEMT. The WSDL document in a WSDL archive file can be used for SOAP message validation.