Wireless and Mobile Systems Design

Lecture 4
Middleware: Client-Server
Computing
 Lecture Objectives
● Differentiate and exemplify client-server,
client-agent-server, and client-intercept-server
models of middleware
● Understand functionality provided by middleware for
client, agent, and server software development
● Understand how the client-server computational
model middleware is able to deal with heterogeneous
wireless devices and scalability
● Characterize the design requirements of example
client-server applications and rationalize the choice
of middleware and design for application
development
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 Resources
● H. Gunzer, “Introduction to Web Services,” March
2002, http://bdn.borland.com/article/images/28818/
webservices.pdf
● Microsoft Developer Network, “Web Services
Basics,” http://msdn.microsoft.com/webservices/
understanding/webservicebasics/

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 Agenda
● Client-server and middleware overview
● Client-server computational models
■ Client-server
■ Client-agent-server
■ Client-intercept-server
● Web services overview
● Web services based on Extensible Markup Language
(XML) for mobile devices
■ Small Object Access Protocol (SOAP)
■ Web Service Description Language (WSDL)

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 Middleware (Review)
● Middleware is a layer between the operating system
and applications that provides a set of services
■ Abstract interface to the application
■ Uniform view of operating systems, networks, and hardware
platforms

Application Programs
API
Middleware

Operating System
and Networking Services

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 Client-Server vs. Peer-to-Peer
Client-Server Computing Peer-to-Peer Computing

Server

• Client initiates • Any participant can

communications initiate communication
• Client issues request • Any device can
to a server generate a request
• Server replies or • Any device may
performs some service provide a response
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 Client-Server Models for Middleware
● Client-server
● Client-agent-server
● Client-intercept-server models

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 Client-Server Model (1)
● Communication models
■ Message passing with queuing
■ Remote procedure call (RPC)
● Client-server synchronization
■ Synchronous
○ Inadequate – Client is blocked if disconnected
■ Asynchronous
○ Client requests are queued locally and control is returned
immediately to the client
○ When the mobile is connected, the queue is drained in
the background and any queued messages or calls are
forwarded to the server

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 Client-Server Model (2)
Wireless Fixed
Network Network
Mobile Host
Application
Application Server
Client

● Optimization for mobile/wireless involves changes at

both the client and server
● Example (worst-case)
■ Standard web browser accessing an HTTP server over a
wireless link
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 Client-Agent-Server Model (1)
● Computation is split into two units
■ Client-agent – optimized for mobile environment
■ Agent-server –traditional (non-mobile) design
● Dealing with disconnection
■ Clients submit requests to the agent and retrieve responses
from the agent upon reconnection
■ The agent can employ optimization and transformation
techniques to the data to be transmitted depending, based
on
○ Type of data
○ Type of devices
○ Application-specific requirements

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 Client-Agent-Server Model (2)
Wireless Fixed
Network Network
Mobile Host
Application
Application Agent
Server
Client

● Optimization for mobile/wireless involves client and

agent
● Single application server to support both fixed
network clients and mobile clients
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 Client-Agent-Server Example
● Wireless Application Protocol (WAP)
■ Mobile device runs the client
■ The gateway acts as the agent
■ Standard HTTP server can be used

encoded
Client Gateway Server
request request
Web Encoders HTTP
Browser wireless Decoders Server

Protocol CGI,
encoded
Gateways response etc.
response
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 Client-Intercept-Server Model (1)
● Inter-agent optimization protocols can be used
between the client-side agent and the server-side
agent
■ Minimize communication cost via…
○ Caching
○ Differencing
○ Header reduction
○ One-HTTP connection per session
● Caching/prefetching at the client agent to allow
disconnected operations
■ For example, ADO .NET/SQL server CE

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 Client-Intercept-Server Model (2)
Wireless Fixed
Network Network
Mobile Host

Client Application
Agent
Client Side Server
Agent

● Example – IBM Web Express

■ Web Browser (client) ↔ HTTP ↔ Client-side agent ↔ TCP/IP
connection ↔ Server side agent ↔ HTTP ↔ Web server

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 Web Services
● Web Services are encapsulated, loosely coupled
contracted functions offered via standard protocols
where:
■ Encapsulated – implementation of the function is never seen
from the outside
■ Loosely coupled – changing the implementation of one
function does not require change of the invoking function
■ Contracted – there are publicly available descriptions of the
function’s behavior, how to bind to the function, and its
input and output parameters

From webservices.org, quoted in H. Gunzer, “Introduction to Web Services

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Web Services Architecture (1)

Service
Broker

inquire publish

Service Service
Requester bind Provider

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 Web Services Architecture (2)
● Service broker
■ Look up service between a service provider and a service
requestor
● Service provider
■ Publishes its services to the service broker
● Service requester
■ Asks the service broker where to find a suitable service
provider and then binds itself to the provider

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 Web Services Components
UDDI is the
“yellow pages”
of web services ● XML – Extensible
Markup Language
Web Services

UDDI ● SOAP – Simple Object

Access Protocol
WSDL
● WSDL – Web Services
SOAP Definition Language
XML ● UDDI – Universal
HTTP FTP SMTP Discovery Description
Integration
XML normally
carried using
HTTP
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 Extensible Markup Language (XML)
● XML is a platform-neural data standard for
describing, storing and transporting data across the
web
● XML is a core technology for web services
■ XML is the basis for separately developed web services to
interact with each other
■ XML facilitates component development
○Package application functionality as small, easily
connected web services
○Compose an application using “web services”
components

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 XML and Microsoft’s .NET
● .NET is a Microsoft technology to develop XML web
services on many platforms
■ .NET Active Server Page (ASP) – used to develop web
services
■ .NET Compact Framework (CF) – used to develop web
services on small devices
■ Microsoft Internet Toolkit (MIT) – used to develop server-
side proxies to deal with heterogeneous mobile devices

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 XML and Wireless Web Access (1)
● The synergy between XML and wireless can be
considered from two perspectives:
■ XML as a data representation technology
■ XML as a meta-language (a set of rules to define domain-
specific data definition languages)
● XML as a data representation technology
■ Facilitates content delivery (via XML transformation) to a
wide variety of mobile devices and platforms

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 XML and Wireless Web Access (2)
● XML as a meta-language
■ Key to the success of XML-based wireless web access
initiatives
■ WML – XML-compliant language used by WAP 1.0
■ XHTML – XML-compliant language adopted by WAP 1.2 and
future i-mode
■ Web Service Description Language (WSDL) – XML-compliant
language normally used in a WSDL document to describe a
web service’s interface
○ Provides clients with information on how to invoke a web
service

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 XML Transformation
● XML separates the data
from a fixed description
of how the data should
be displayed cHTML
● Extensible Style-Sheet
Language (XLS)
describes how to XML XSLT XHTML
display content
● XSLT is a scheme to
transform XML data into WML
device-specific formats

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XSLT to Target XML to Different Devices
WML
XSLT
for WAP
<?xml version=‘1.0’?>
<response id=“Result”>
<class
cHTML
ECE/CS 4984
</class> XSLT XSLT
<price> for i-mode Engine
Invaluable
</price>
</response> PDA-specific
XSLT
for PDA

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SOAP for Invoking Web Services (1)
● Small Object Access Protocol (SOAP) is a standard
for invoking XML web services through remote
procedure calls over HTTP
● Used by Microsoft’s .NET
■ .NET Compact Frame implements SOAP 1.1 to allow smart
devices to establish connections and move data to other
devices

UDDI
WDSL
SOAP
XML

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 SOAP for Invoking Web Services (2)
● To make a method call to a web service…
■ Client first learns the service interface via the server’s Web
Services Description Language (WSDL) document
■ Client then sends a request to the URL where the service is
running in a SOAP message in XML format for the RPC

UDDI
WDSL
SOAP
XML

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 SOAP and WSDL
● WSDL document specifies
■ The name of the method to be invoked
■ The namespace Universal Resource Identifier (URI) for the
method name
○ A namespace is a unique string to fully qualify XML
element and attribute names
■ The parameter names and their data types
■ The SOAPAction
○ Placed in the HTTP header that the client sends when it
invokes the service
■ The URL at which the service is running

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 Accessing Web Services

From http://www.learnxmlws.com/tutors/wsdl/wsdl.aspx

Middleware: Client-Server Computing

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 WSDL for Defining Web Services
● WSDL is an XML-based language used to…
■ Define a web service
■ Describe how to access methods provided by the service

UDDI
WDSL
SOAP
XML

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Example: WSDL of a Weather Service
<definitions name ='weatherservice'
xmlns='http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/wsdl/'>
<service name='WeatherService' >
…
</service>
</definitions>

● <definitions> element is the root element of the

WSDL document
● Declare the WSDL name space as the default name
space for the document
■ All elements and attributes belong to this name space
unless they have another name space prefix
● Each service is defined using a service element
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 Port Definitions in WSDL
● Within a service element, you specify the different
“ports” on which this service is accessible
● A port specifies the service URL
● Each port has a unique name and a binding attribute
● When using SOAP, the port element contains a
<soap:address/> element with the service address
URL

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 Example: WSDL Port Definitions
● If the URL is http://www.ws/demos/wsdl/devxpert/
weatherservice.asp, the port definition would look
like …
<port name=‘WeatherSoapPort’
binding=‘wsdlns:WeatherSoapBinding’>
<soap:address location=
‘http://www.ws/demos/wsdl/devxpert/weatherservice.asp’ />
</port>

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 WSDL Message Element
● To use web services in an RPC model, WSDL
describes the message structures by using the
<message> element
■ Each <message> contains zero or more <part> elements.
■ A <part> corresponds to a parameter or a return value in the
RPC call

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 Example: Messages Elements
● The GetTemperature method would include one input
message and one output message
<message name='Weather.GetTemperature'>
<part name='zipcode' type='xsd:string'/>
<part name='celsius' type='xsd:boolean'/>
</message>

<message name='Weather.GetTemperatureResponse'>
<part name='Result' type='xsd:float'/>
</message>

xsd: float is predefined in http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema

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 WSDL Operation Element
● The WSDL <operation> element is used to specify
which message is the input and which message is
the output
● The parameterOrder attribute is optional and may be
used to specify a space-delimited list of part names
to indicate the order of parameters when making the
RPC call
● <input> and <output> elements are specified within
an <operation> element
■ Each refers to the corresponding message by its fully
qualified name

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 Example: Operation Element
● Example: wsdlns:Weather.GetTemperature

<portType name='WeatherSoapPort'>
<operation name='GetTemperature'
parameterOrder='zipcode celsius'>
<input message='wsdlns:Weather.GetTemperature' />
<output message='wsdlns:Weather.GetTemperatureResponse' />
</operation>

<!-- other operations would go here -->

</portType>

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 WSDL Binding Element (1)
● The WSDL <binding> element is used to bind a <port>

<binding name='WeatherSoapBinding'
type='wsdlns:WeatherSoapPort' >
…
</binding>
● Inside the <binding>, element the <soap:binding>
extension element can specify the transport protocol
and style of the request
■ SOAP can be used over HTTP, SMTP, or, possibly, any other
transport
■ RPC and document are the two styles

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 WSDL Binding Element (2)
● For each operation that this service exposes, a value
of the SOAP Action is specified in the
<soap:operation> element
■ The client must put the SOAP Action value in the HTTP
header when it invokes the service

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 Example: Binding Element

<binding name='WeatherSoapBinding'
type='wsdlns:WeatherSoapPort' >
<soap:binding style='rpc'
transport='http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/http' />
<operation name='GetTemperature' >
<soap:operation
soapAction='http://tempuri.org/action/
Weather.GetTemperature' />
…
</operation>
</binding>

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 WSDL Example I (1)
<binding name='WeatherSoapBinding' type='wsdlns:WeatherSoapPort' >
<soap:binding style='rpc'
transport='http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/http' />
<operation name='GetTemperature' >
<soap:operation
soapAction='http://tempuri.org/action/Weather.GetTemperature' />
<input>
<soap:body use='encoded' namespace='http://tempuri.org/message/'
encodingStyle='http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/encoding/' />
</input>
<output>
<soap:body use='encoded' namespace='http://tempuri.org/message/'
encodingStyle='http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/encoding/' />
</output>
</operation>
</binding>

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 WSDL Example I (2)
● The <operation> element can…
■ Include <input> and an <output> element
■ Use a <soap:body> element within each to specify how the
data is encoded
● The URI http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/encoding/
indicates the SOAP encoding style as described in
the SOAP 1.1 specification

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 WSDL Example II (1)
● WSDL of XMethods, a delayed stock quote XML web
service

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 WSDL Example II (2)
<service name="net.xmethods.services.stockquote.StockQuoteService">
<documentation>net.xmethods.services.stockquote.StockQuote web
service</documentation>
<port name="net.xmethods.services.stockquote.StockQuotePort"
binding="tns:net.xmethods.services.stockquote.StockQuoteBinding">
<soap:address location="http://66.28.98.121:9090/soap" />
</port>
</service>
<message name="getQuoteResponse1">
<part name="Result" type="xsd:float" />
</message>
<message name="getQuoteRequest1">
<part name="symbol" type="xsd:string" />
</message>
<portType name="net.xmethods.services.stockquote.StockQuotePortType">
<operation name="getQuote" parameterOrder="symbol">
<input message="tns:getQuoteRequest1" />
<output message="tns:getQuoteResponse1" />
</operation>
</portType>
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 Summary
● Examined client-server computational model,
including models for client-server middleware
■ Client-server
■ Client-agent-server
■ Client-intercept-server
● Discussed web services
● Examined web services based on XML

UDDI
WSDL
SOAP
XML
HTTP FTP SMTP
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