Summary

This chapter explored how to get around the limitations of synchronous Web services by looking into the technologies and techniques that can bring a level of asynchronicity to applications. It looked in depth into the SOAP 1.2 specification and what it brings to allow for asynchronous Web service integration through some of the new HTTP status codes that it introduces, and it also explored how to implement these in .NET and Java.

Various techniques and design patterns were discussed, such as façades, for asynchronous communication between Web services running on mixed mode systems and how they can interoperate. These were demonstrated using the Supply Chain Management scenario from the Web Services Interoperability (WSI) organization.

Finally, a number of best practices and pitfalls associated with these approaches were discussed.