Web services are generally accessed using SOAP (Simple Object Access Protocol).
SOAP is an application-level protocol that was developed to freely exchange data between applications on the internet. SOAP is layered over HTTP which means it can be used over any network which allows HTTP, and uses XML to represent messages between the client and a web service.
To test the performance of web services NeoLoad offers an optional SOAP module which provides 3 ways to define requests:
- Requests defined using WSDL (Web Service Definition Language)
- Manually defined requests using the integrated XML editor
- Recorded requests
Creating SOAP requests using WSDL saves time as the message arguments are validated by NeoLoad to ensure that the request's syntax is correct. NeoLoad also has the ability to test the server before the client is ready, since it doesn't need to record the SOAP traffic.
NeoLoad then runs the performance test and collates and reports the results in the normal way.
