Chapter 30. The System.Web.Services Namespace
The System.Web.Services
namespace contains the types used for creating web services. Web
services are "component-like" units
of programming logic that exist on a web server as
.asmx files. Web services can be incorporated
seamlessly into Windows or ASP.NET applications. Web services differ
from many other methods of remote method invocation (like DCOM) in
that they use open XML-based standards, work over normal text HTTP
channels, and can be consumed (with a little more programming work)
from applications on other platforms and non-Windows operating
systems.
The System.Web.Services namespace is the starting
point for creating web services. It contains a
WebService class that custom web services can
inherit from and the WebMethodAttribute and
WebServiceAttribute, which are used to mark web
service classes and methods and add additional information. Most
types in other web service namespaces are used seamlessly by the .NET
framework and are not used directly by the .NET programmer. Figure 30-1 shows the types in this namespace.
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