Extension ID

com.castsoftware.wbslinker

What's new?

Please see Web Services Linker - 1.6 - Release Notes for more information.

Description

The "Web Services Linker" (com.castsoftware.wbslinker) extension is a "dependent" extension that automatically creates links for "web services" between client and server components by following a particular protocol based on objects and names. The extension can be downloaded on its own as a standalone extension, however, it is usually automatically downloaded as a dependency with other extensions such as:

• HTML5 and JavaScript
• AngularJS
• Node.js
• TypeScript
• jQuery
• SAPUI5
• WCF
• JAX-RS
• Spring MVC
• Objective-C Analyzer

For example for the AngularJS extension:

What does it do?

The Web Service Linker automatically creates cross-technology call links between client (front end) and server (back end) objects. For example, AngularJS front end connected to JEE/Spring MVC back end (click to enlarge):

How does it do it?

The Web Services Linker supports two modes:

• REST services
• WSDL/SOAP services

The connection is made via four "root" objects:

REST services

The Web Service Linker searches for objects stored in the CAST Analysis Service schema whose type inherits from CAST_ResourceService or CAST_WebServiceLinker_Resource. These objects represent queries to web services on the client side. Then it searches for the web services on the server side: these are objects whose type inherits from CAST_WebService_Operation or CAST_WebServiceLinker_Operation.

When a match is found using the properties CAST_ResourceService.uri / CAST_WebServiceLinker_Resource.uri and CAST_WebService_Operation.identification.name / CAST_WebServiceLinker_Operation.identification.name and type of both objects, then a link is created.

Matching algorithm

The matching is done between using the properties CAST_ResourceService.uri / CAST_WebServiceLinker_Resource.uri and CAST_WebService_Operation.identification.name / CAST_WebServiceLinker_Operation.identification.name.

Before matching, the Web Services Linker transforms the CAST_ResourceService.uri using following rules, in this order:

• It replace all "//" with "/{}/" except "//" after ":" (to avoid replacing "http://"), supposing that a parameter was intended between both "/" (REST format).
• It removes everything after "?" in the uri (to suppress uri parameters part which are not part of REST format parameters).
• It adds a "/" at the end of uri when not present

 The result is then compared to CAST_WebService_Operation.identification.name / CAST_WebServiceLinker_Operation.identification.name using the endswith function, ignoring the uri part corresponding to the operation name part whose value is {}.

Examples of matches

A client side url like:

Examples

Server side

The Analysis Service schema contains an object CAST_WebService_GetOperation named /users/

@RequestMapping("/users")
public class UserController {
    
    @RequestMapping(method = RequestMethod.GET, produces = "application/json; charset=utf-8")
    @ResponseBody
    public PagedResources<UserResource> collectionList(...){
	   ...
    }

Client side

The Analysis Service schema contains an object CAST_AngularJS_GetResourceService whose property CAST_ResourceService.uri equals 'resources/scenarios/{}/'

return $resource('resources/scenarios/:id', {'id':'@id'}, {
	'query': { method: 'GET', isArray: false },
	'save': {method:'POST', isArray: false },
	'update': {method:'PUT', isArray: false },
	'notify': {method:'PUT', params: {notify: true}, isArray: false },
	'remove': {method:'POST', isArray: false, headers:{'X-HTTP-Method-Override':'DELETE'}}

WSDL/SOAP services

WSDL is generally used in the context of SOAP web services: calls are to an operation, and operations are identified by :

• operation name
• port type

Samples

Client side

BPEL

Invocation of EmployeeTravelStatusPT.EmployeeTravelStatus:

<invoke partnerLink="employeeTravelStatus" 
	portType="emp:EmployeeTravelStatusPT" 
	operation="EmployeeTravelStatus"
	inputVariable="EmployeeTravelStatusRequest" 
	outputVariable="EmployeeTravelStatusResponse" />

Server side

JAX-WS

Reception of operation EmployeeTravelStatusPT.EmployeeTravelStatus:

import javax.jws.WebService;

@WebService(targetNamespace = "http://superbiz.org/wsdl")
public class EmployeeTravelStatusPT {

    public int EmployeeTravelStatus(int add1, int add2)
    {
        
    }
}

BPEL

Reception of operation TravelApprovalPT.TravelApproval:

<receive partnerLink="client" 
	portType="trv:TravelApprovalPT" 
	operation="TravelApproval" 
	variable="TravelRequest"
	createInstance="yes" />

Cross-Technology Transaction