How to View Soap Messages

SOAP stands for Simple Object Access Protocol and is a defined standard communications protocol used for exchanging information between Web services. SOAP messages use XML (Extensible Markup Language) to define the information contained in its messages. The SOAP protocol is designed to be the messaging framework that a Web service can be built upon and is considered an enabling technology. Many times, software developers will have a need to view the information sent and received by SOAP messages.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Ethereal Communications Data Viewing Program

1. Download and install the Ethereal Soap message trap and viewing program (see Resources section below for link).

2. Open the Ethereal program by selecting "Start->Programs->Ethereal->Ethereal" from the start menu of your computer.

3. Initiate a Soap message capture session by choosing the "Start a Live Capture" menu button in the Ethereal program.

4. Run the program that sends Soap messages that you desire to view. When you have conducted the desired actions in the program, choose the "Stop" button in the Ethereal program.

5. Right-click a listing that begins with "POST" in the Ethereal viewer, and a dialog box will appear displaying the SOAP requests in red and responses in blue.

References

• Ethereal Resource and Home Page
• Guide to Viewing Soap Messages With Ethereal

Resources

• Ethereal Download Site