Java Reference
In-Depth Information
Choosing between SOAP and REST
services
The choice of adopting SOAP rather than REST depends on your application's re-
quirements. SOAP web services are exposed using its own well-defined protocol and
focus on exposing pieces of application logic as services. So if your requirement is
to consume business services that are exposed using a well-defined and negotiated
contract (between the service consumer and the service provider), SOAP web ser-
vices are a perfect match.
On the other hand, if you need to access some server resources using stateless
HTTP invocations and as little as the navigation bar of your browser, you should prob-
ably go with RESTful web services.
That being said, there may still be some scenarios that could fit both the options, and
you are free to choose whichever web service suits your requirements the best. Since
I have never been able to cure my adversity for SOAP-based Java clients (which are
inherently more complex to code than other languages), I'd go for REST web ser-
vices; however, that's just one man's opinion!
