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Publishing and Finding Web Services Using UDDI

 

Contents

  1. Overview
  2. WebLogic Server UDDI Features
  3. UDDI 2.0 Server
  4. UDDI Directory Explorer
  5. UDDI Client API
  6. Pluggable tModel

 

Overview of UDDI

UDDI stands for Universal Description, Discovery and Integration and is used to help businesses perform transactions.

UDDI registries contain information about businesses, including what services they offer, and what communication standards they use to conduct transactions.

UDDI is built using SOAP data communication standards.

 

UDDI and Web Services

The owners of Web Services publish them to UDDI registries. Clients can search this registry to find the intended service. Information retrieved includes the service invocation point as well as other information to help identify the service and its functionality.

Web Service capabilities are exposed through a programming interface, and usually explained through Web Services Description Language (WSDL). In a typical publish-and-inquire scenario, the provider publishes its business, registers a service under it and defines a binding template with technical information on its Web Service. The binding template also holds reference to one or several tModels, which represent abstract interfaces implemented by this Web Service. The tModels might have been uniquely published by the provider, with information on the interfaces and URL references to the WSDL document.

A typical client inquiry may have one of two objectives:

  1. To seek an implementation of a known interface.

    In other words, the client has a tModel ID and seeks binding templates referencing that tModel.

  2. To seek the updated value of the invocation point (i.e., access point) of a known binding template ID.

 

UDDI and Business Registry

As a Business Registry solution, UDDI enables companies to advertise the business products and services they provide, as well as how they conduct business transactions on the Web. This use of UDDI has the potential of fueling growth of business-to-business (B2B) electronic commerce.

The minimum required information to publish a business is a single business name. Once completed, a full description of a business entity may contain a wealth of information, all of which helps to advertise the business entity and its products and services in a precise and accessible manner.

A Business Registry may contain the following:

  • Business Identification - Multiple names and descriptions of the business, comprehensive contact information and standard business identifiers such as a tax identifier.
  • Categories - Standard categorization information (for example a D-U-N-S business category number).
  • Service Description - Multiple names and descriptions of a service. As a container for service information, companies can advertise numerous services, while clearly displaying the ownership of services. The bindingTemplate information describes how to access the service.
  • Standards Compliance - In some cases it is important to specify compliance with standards. These standards might display detailed technical requirements on how to use the service.
  • Custom Categories - It is possible to publish proprietary specifications (tModels) that identify or categorize businesses or services.

 

UDDI Data Structure

The data structure within UDDI is comprised of four constructions: a businessEntity structure, a businessService structure, a bindingTemplate structure and a tModel structure.

The following table outlines the difference between these constructions when used for Web Service or Business Registry applications.

Data Structure

Web Service

Business Registry

businessEntity Represents a Web Service provider:

  • Company name

  • Contact detail

  • Other business information
 Represents a company, a division or a department within a company:

  • Company name(s)

  • Contact details

  • Identifiers and Categories
businessService A logical group of one or several Web Services.API(s) with a single name stored as a child element, contained by the business entity named above. A group of services may reside in a single businessEntity.

  • Multiple names and descriptions

  • Categories

  • Indicators of compliancy with standards
bindingTemplate A single Web Service.Information provided here gives client applications the technical information needed to bind and interact with the target Web Service.Contains access point (i.e., URI to invoke a Web Service). Further instances of standards conformity.Access points for the service in form of URLs, phone numbers, email addresses, fax numbers or other similar address types.
tModel Represents a technical specification; typically a specifications pointer, or metadata about a specification document, including a name and a URL pointing to the actual specifications. In the context of Web Services, the actual specifications document is presented in the form of a WSDL file. Represents a standard or technical specification, either well established or registered by a user for specific use.