Cobol - Web Services & Web Apps - Was: Accessing desktop COM components from Java

Author

Web Services & Web Apps - Was: Accessing desktop COM components from Java

andrewmcdonagh

2007-06-25, 9:55 pm

On Jun 22, 1:14 am, "Pete Dashwood"
<dashw...@removethis.enternet.co.nz> wrote:
> "andrewmcdonagh" <andrewmcdon...@gmail.com> wrote in message
>
> news:1182463212.534723.242990@n60g2000hse.googlegroups.com...>> > On Jun 4, 2:40 pm, "Pete Dashwood"
>
> <snipped>
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> Brilliant! Best thing I ever did. Whole new world... online video tutorials,
> help that actually helps, Intellisense in the IDE (blows me away every day I
> use it :-)) and a straightforward, consistent syntax. I am totally sold on
> DotNET/Mono and the FCL.
>
> For Web Development (I am currently udertaking a major one to support my
> Address Validation Service engine, which is around 4000 lines of OO COBOL
> and has integrated seamlessly and (almost :-)) effortlessly with C# through
> the Framework Class Library Interop services), I love the autowired event
> processing and pre-compiled code-behind pages so that everything runs
> securely on the server. I've been looking at AJAX and may use this for the
> next project. It certainly seems like a good way to organise and control
> client side code.
>
> A very happy bunny :-)!
>
> Pete.

Sounds like you are having fun!

The more proficient you get with C# & Java, the more you'll need to
start using their respective Unit testing frameworks (nUnit & JUnit)
as these are starting to become widespread requirements for developer
skill sets (and as a Software Mgr let me tell you - its difficult to
find those with good Unit testing skills!)

Also, two tools I'd recommend for Testing these Web Services and Web
Applications...

1) soapUI - http://www.soapui.org/

great for Web services - its free - give it a WSDL it'll auto generate
the HTTP request for you to fill in any parameters, so this allows you
to connect to a real WS and test it. The tests can even be saved and
played back -giving you an automated system testing framework.

2) Selenium - http://www.openqa.org/selenium/

Another great free too for Web application testing. It drives
browsers (IE, Netscape, Firefox, etc) directly and so allows you to
very easily script automated tests for your web app.

Have fun!

Andrew

Pete Dashwood

2007-06-25, 9:55 pm

"andrewmcdonagh" <andrewmcdonagh@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:1182808756.795508.36150@o61g2000hsh.googlegroups.com...
> On Jun 22, 1:14 am, "Pete Dashwood"
> <dashw...@removethis.enternet.co.nz> wrote:
>
> Sounds like you are having fun!
>
> The more proficient you get with C# & Java, the more you'll need to
> start using their respective Unit testing frameworks (nUnit & JUnit)
> as these are starting to become widespread requirements for developer
> skill sets (and as a Software Mgr let me tell you - its difficult to
> find those with good Unit testing skills!)
>
> Also, two tools I'd recommend for Testing these Web Services and Web
> Applications...
>
> 1) soapUI - http://www.soapui.org/
>
> great for Web services - its free - give it a WSDL it'll auto generate
> the HTTP request for you to fill in any parameters, so this allows you
> to connect to a real WS and test it. The tests can even be saved and
> played back -giving you an automated system testing framework.
>
>
> 2) Selenium - http://www.openqa.org/selenium/
>
> Another great free too for Web application testing. It drives
> browsers (IE, Netscape, Firefox, etc) directly and so allows you to
> very easily script automated tests for your web app.
>
> Have fun!
>
> Andrew
>
Thanks Andrew.

For testing my web service locally I can use the generated form that MS
provide when the WSDL is generated. (This is automatic from VS 2005.) Like
the product you describe above, it also allows auto generation of parameters
based on the WSDL. However, my WS sees a single parameter (InterfaceBlock)
which actually needs to have various fields within it set, and this is not
so easy.(it is a large block (8192 bytes) and some of the fields that must
be set are single byte flags...)

For testing remotely I knocked up a C# app. in minutes (based on something
someone else showed me; I wasn't experienced in it at the time, but now I do
it as a matter of course :-)), using the Web Application template in VS2005.
As the interface to my WS is fairly complex, this was a good approach (I
could include my InterfaceBlockBuilder Class to set fields in the interface
block, which, being originally in COBOL, is fixed length fields).

So, I'm pretty much covered for testing the WS.

The Selenium tool sounds interesting and I'll certainly have a look at that.
Thanks.

(So much to do... so little time :-))

Pete.

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