Which SOAP XML object serialization library for Java would you recommend?

Question

Which Java SOAP XML object serialization library would you recommend for Java object exchange with other platforms / languages (.NET, Delphi)?

Commu

Answer 1

I think you have answered your own question.

XStream (outputting as JSON) is a nice clean solution. If you alias types you get a clean output format. After that it doesn't matter which SOAP stack you use so long as it is nice and interoperable with Delphi/.NET.

Answer 2

In addition to Axis2 which works ok, Sun's JAX-WS (version 2) and Apache CXF (nee XFire) are worth checking out, it Soap is your thing. CXF may be the most mature of the 3, so that's my favorite, but all 3 are pretty good.

Answer 3

The standard library for this would probably be Apache Axis1. I would advise using axis2 instead of axis 1.4- though it works pretty well.

Bearing in mind that the all of the SOAP extensions make the dream of interoperability just that... a dream.

Answer 4

I would recommend CXF. It is a very good services stack and includes JAXB data binding and JAX-WS support. You may want to look at an open source integration platform like Mule that includes CXF (also supports Axis and XStream) if you need more advanced transformation and routing of your messages. It is lightweight and can be embedded or run without an app server.

Answer 5

I prefer JAX-WS (with JAXB 2.1 databinding) over the other liberaries I've used (JAX-RPC, Axis 1 and 2, but not XFire). The JAXB 2 databinding uses generics, which makes for a pleasant mapping of properties with a maxoccurs > 1. JAX-WS itself is reasonably well documented and provides a reasonably good API. The method and parameter annotations can get a bit out of hand in some cases - XML hell in annotation form. It usually isn't so bad.

One of the nice aspects of the JAX-WS stack is project Metro, which Sun co-developed with Microsoft and interoperates well with the web service support .NET 3.0, going so far as to implement MTOM in a workable fashion.