- Web Services Vision
- Inside the JWSDP
- Testing Tools
- Summary
Testing Tools
The third piece of the JWSDP includes a suite of tools to help developers get started with Java-based Web Services technologies. Among the tools included in the JWSDP are discussed in the following sections.
JavaServer Pages Standard Tag Library (JSTL)
JSPs make it easy to develop front-end, server-based functionality, especially for developers well-versed in HTML. However, the downside of the JSP model is the proliferation of custom tag libraries covering different pieces of functionality, but with many doing the same things in different and incompatible ways. The rationale for JSTL is to standardize a basic set of tags that everyone can use and reusetags that provide functions for iteration, conditional processing, and (most importantly) XML manipulation to assist developers in operating in a Web Services context.
Apache Tomcat 4
The Apache open-source reference implementation of the JSP 1.2 and Java Servlet 2.3 specifications is a useful resource for testing out server-side XML processing. JSP 1.2 and Java Servlet 2.3 APIs add features that Web Services application developers can take advantage of, such as requesting an XML view of a page at compile time, using custom tags to validate a page, and using filters to provide chained processing of incoming data. The Apache Tomcat implementation lets Java developers begin testing their Web Services logic immediately after downloading the JWSDP.
Java WSDP Registry Server
The JWSDP also includes an implementation of a UDDI registry so that developers can develop and test the APIs that relate to registry access.