Special Edition Using SOAP

Data Types Overview

Many developers will rely on SOAP to transmit data in text format and perform any required data translation at the endpoints. In many cases, this is the best way to ensure interoperability, but it does entail extra work for the developer and affects the performance of the application. SOAP supports a relatively short list of simple and complex data types. You’ll find the simple types defined at the SOAP encoding schema Web site (http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/encoding/). Figure A.1 shows some of what you’ll see at this Web site. Table A.1 describes each of these types. It also tells you how to use them within a message.

Figure A.1. You’ll reference the SOAP encoding schema as part of most messages.

Table A.1. SOAP Simple ...