Web Service for Distributed Communication Systems

In this paper, we present an approach for web service based distributed communication systems. Unlike conventional one-way web service, which is based on a stateless request/response interaction pattern, communication systems typically require stateful, two-way, full duplex interaction, and in many cases, it needs to establish certain association or context in the form of "session" before any message can be exchanged. We describe a system level architecture for distributed communication systems based on two-way, full duplex web service interaction that supports stateful and session based web service transactions. In addition, we address the issue of enabling two-way web service interaction to cross enterprise domains and firewalls, and the approach of two-way web service router gateway, TARGET, is described. TARGET is a generic solution for two-way web service interaction to traverse legitimately through NATs and strictly configured firewalls. Different from conventional web service access gateway, TARGET is based on a novel combination of two-way SOAP message tunneling, service local registry, and service routing to enable two-way web services for distributed communication systems. A research web service based distributed communication system has been developed that supports web service based conferencing services crossing enterprise domains and firewalls. Our experimental service results indicate that a full web service based distributed communication system is not only feasible but also desirable.