Sebastopol, CA--Given Perl's natural fit for web applications
development, it's no surprise that Perl is also a natural choice for
web services development. Perl is the most popular web programming
language, with strong implementations of both SOAP and XML-RPC, the
leading methods used to distribute applications using web services. But
most books on web services focus on writing these applications in Java
or Visual Basic, leaving Perl programmers with few resources to get
them started. Programming Web Services with Perl by Randy J. Ray and
Pavel Kulchenko (O'Reilly, US $39.95) changes that, bringing Perl users
all the information they need to create web services using their
favorite language.
Coauthor Ray believes that XML-RPC and SOAP represent a significant
step forward in the evolution of distributed systems programming, and
hopes to encourage Perl programmers to begin to write these types of
applications so they can see for themselves just how well they can be
used to solve problems. "The role and validity of XML-based distributed
programming is still subject to wider acceptance and implementation,"
Ray explains. "People and companies are still debating whether these
solutions fit their needs. But I feel that web services are potentially
a huge step in distributed programming, in that they take current
technology, such as XML, and use it to build systems that are much more
language-independent and platform-independent than ever before. As the
Internet grows in popularity and its presence in people's day-to-day
lives expands, the importance of services-as-content will grow."
"Programming Web Services with Perl" introduces the major web services
standards, such as XML-RPC, SOAP, WSDL, and UDDI, and shows how to
implement Perl servers and clients using these standards. Readers will
find detailed references on both the XML and SOAP toolkits, and learn
when to use one technology in favor of the other. The book is rich with
programming examples that will be useful well past the learning stage.
And, beyond the basics, the book offers solutions to problems of
security, authentication, and scalability.
Some of the topics covered in the book are:
- HTTP and XML basics
- XML-RPC and the toolkits
- SOAP and toolkits
- A comprehensive reference to SOAP::Lite
- Using SOAP with SMTP and other protocols
- Advertising and discovering with UDDI and WSDL
- Writing a REST-compliant web service
- A guide to the world of emerging web services standards
"Programming Web Services with Perl" was written for Perl programmers
who have no prior knowledge of web services. Readers can pick up this
book without any understanding of XML-RPC or SOAP and be able to apply
these technologies easily, through the use of publicly available Perl
modules detailed in the book.
Additional Resources:
Programming Web Services with Perl
Randy J. Ray and Pavel Kulchenko
ISBN 0-596-00206-8, 470 pages, $39.95 (US), $61.95 (CAN), 28.50 (UK)
order@oreilly.com
1-800-998-9938; 1-707-827-7000
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