Updated March 6, 2023
Introduction to SOAP Web Services Interview Questions And Answers
SOAP is an abbreviation of the Simple Object Access Protocol. XML protocol is used for Soap web services. SOAP is recommended by W3C for communication between two web applications. Soap is platform-independent as well as language-independent. Using SOAP one can interact with several types of programming languages and applications too. SOAP has its own security standard known as WS Security. SOAP uses XML format which is first parsed to be able to be read. It defines many standards that must be followed. Sometimes, soap is slow and consumes more resources and bandwidth. SOAP uses WSDL only and hence it doesn’t have other mechanisms to identify the service.
SOAP can be used in multiple types of messaging systems. It can be delivered through a lot of transport protocols. An initial focus of SOAP is remote procedure calls which are transported using HTTP.
CORBA, DCOM, and Java RMI are other frameworks that provide similar functionality to SOAP the one important difference being SOAP messages are written entirely in XML as stated above.
Now, if you are looking for a job which is related to SOAP Web Services then you need to prepare for the 2023 SOAP Web Services Interview Questions. It is true that every interview is different as per the different job profiles. Here, we have prepared the important Interview Questions and Answers which will help you get success in your interview.
In this 2023 SOAP Web Services Interview Questions article, we shall present 10 most important and frequently used SOAP Web Services interview questions. These interview questions are divided into two parts are as follows:
Part 1 – SOAP Web Services Interview Questions (Basic)
This first part covers basic Interview Questions and Answers.
Q1. Explain how does SOAP work?
Answer:
SOAP provides a user interface that is accessed by the client object. The request that it sends goes to the server and is accessed using the server object. It contains other information like the interface name and methods. HTTP is used to send the XML to the server via POST method. After this method is analyzed and the result is sent to the client. The server creates more XML that consists of responses to those requests using HTTP. SMTP server or POP3 protocol can also be used by a client to send the XML.
Q2. How can users make maximum benefits from the functionalities which are provided by SOAP?
Answer:
- For entering an address in the webpage or an address instance that can be done on the SOAP call use PutAddress().
- For allowing the insertion of a complete document of XML type into the web page, use PutListing().
- Forgetting a query name and also to get the result that best matches given query, use GetAddress().
Q3. Explain available approaches to develop SOAP-based web services?
Answer:
Two different methods are available to develop SOAP-based web services.
- Contract-first approach: In this approach, the contract is first defined by XML and WSDL, while Java classes are derived from the contract at a later stage.
- Contract-last approach: In this approach, Java classes are first defined. contract generation is done after that.
Q4. Define elements of a SOAP message structure?
Answer:
This is the common SOAP Web Services Interview Questions asked in an interview. Elements of a SOAP message structure are as follows :
- Envelope: It translates the XML document and defines the beginning and end of the message, it is the root element.
- Header: It contains information about the message that is sent. It is optional.
- Body: XML data that comprises the message is included in the body.
- Fault: Errors that occur during message processing comes here.
Q5. Mention some syntax rules for SOAP message?
Answer:
They are as Follows:
- SOAP messages must use encoded XML.
- It must use the Envelope namespace.
- Encoding namespace is also mandatory.
- It must not have a DTD reference.
- XML processing instruction should not be there.
Part 2 – SOAP Web Services Interview Questions (Advanced)
Let us now have a look at the advanced Interview Questions and Answers.
Q6. Explain some of the important characteristics of a SOAP envelope element?
Answer:
Important characteristics of a SOAP envelope element are as given below:
- Envelope element is at the root of a SOAP message.
- It is an obligatory section of the SOAP message.
- An envelope includes only one header element.
- Envelop version gets changed with SOAP version change.
- prefix ENV is used for envelope version and also the envelope element.
Q7. Explain the transport method in SOAP?
Answer:
- SOAP uses the application layer and transport layers; HTTP and SMTP are the valid protocol for the application layer. Out of the two, HTTP is more preferable.
- HTTP GET method is used to send SOAP requests and specification contains details about HTTP POST methods.
Q8. Mention some of the major functionalities that are provided by the SOAP protocol class?
Answer:
Simple access methods are provided by SOAP protocol class for all the applications available on the Internet. Some of the important functionalities are as below:
- Call: This class provides the main functionality applicable to remote methods. A call is needed for that. Create the call() method and specify the encoding style of the registry if necessary. call () function, in this case, is used by the RPC call as well. This represents the options of the call object as explained.
- Deployment Descriptor: This class is used to provide information regarding the SOAP services. It can enable easy deployment that too without any need for other approaches.
- DOM2 Writer: This class is used to serializes and use DOM node as XML string. It is to provide greater functionalities.
- RPC Message: This class can be used as a base class which calls and make replies to the request submitted to another or same server.
Q9. When SOAP APIs are used?
Answer:
This is the most popular SOAP Web Services Interview Questions asked in an interview.SOAP APIs are used to create, update, retrieve and delete records. It can handle accounts, leads, and also user-defined objects. SOAP API is used to manage passwords and perform searches. SOAP API can be used in any language that has support for web services.
Q10. Provide some of the advantages of SOAP?
Answer:
Advantages of SOAP are as follows :
- SOAP web services are both platform and language agnostic.
- SOAP can separate the encoding protocol and communications protocol from its runtime environment.
- Web service can also retrieve and also receive SOAP user data from a remote server. Source’s platform here is completely independent of each other.
- Using SOAP, anyone can generate XM. Perl scripts, C++, J2EE app servers all can do the same.
- SOAP uses XML for sending and receiving messages.
- SOAP can use standard internet protocol which is HTTP.
- SOAP generally runs over HTTP. Hence firewall problems are eliminated. When HTTP is used as the binding protocol, an RPC call is made automatically to an HTTP request. This way the RPC response is assigned to an HTTP reply.
- SOAP is very easy to use compared to RMI, CORBA, or DCOM.
- SOAP can be considered as a protocol to move information in a distributed as well as decentralized environment.
- SOAP is independent of the transport protocol which it means is that it can be used to coordinate different protocols.
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