Re: [SOAP] Architecture Question - Opinion

> Nick, Arnaud and (others), > > What I need is not relatively simple. It will be heavily frequented, but I > will have the luxury to have huge machines running the system. It will be > an application with the continual development of modules in that > application. > > In regards to calls to the DB, most of the calls to the DB can be handled > with one SOAP call so there (hopefully) would not be multiple transmissions. > Speed will be important, but there is a threshold, that if I can stay over, > SOAP will be fine. I also want to use SQL Relay to help speed up the back > end process. > > SQL Relay > http://sqlrelay.sourceforge.net/ > http://sqlrelay.sourceforge.net/sqlrelay/introduction.htm It looks interesting. I never heard of it before so i've no idea about it. > The other methodology that I am tinkering with is an XML/XSLT solution. > Where the app server sends and receives custom XML that can be parsed by a > specific XSLT page. I have been with a company that has done this before > with success. What I do not like is the ridged XSLT language and the fact > that the XML is not easily interoperable because it will be so custom. Well, writing a DTD, Schema or Relax-NG you can make it easier for others to cisume it i guess. > I see a real issue here taking PHP to the next level using N-Tier > methodology. Another question in my mind is, where is the biggest > performance issue in the PHP SOAP architecture - the SOAP package > creation/translation or the HTTP transmission between servers. If it is the > HTTP transmission, can I over come that with fiber or gigabit networks. If > it is the creation/translation, would moving to PHP5 (better OO and XML > support) or using the C implementation of XML-RPC help that? We use a webservice at work over the net and through a firewall, i also don't know what servers are running on the other side (except that they are windows servers under .net). But i find the performance low. On the other hand we also use simple xml-rpc between two machines on their vlan an it's pretty fast. And as i said it's simple calls. That said on a pricate network the http transmission shouldn't be a problem depending on the enveloppe size. I haven't tried php5 so i can't say anything. Shane has started work on the new SOAP which will use php5 extensively (and only run with php5) but it's not ready yet. Having used both xml-rpc and soap (to a lesser extent) i find xml-rpc pretty easy to use and performing well. It all depends on what you want to do. > I feel like I am missing a solution out there. Is there any other way PHP > can be integrated into a 3-tier architecture? SRM http://www.vl-srm.net/ might be useful to you. http://www.derickrethans.nl/srm-montreal/talk.html It will let you run a script to which you can connect etc. The document in the second link should be useful. Arnaud.