# Using Ruby Web Service from a C# .NET Client

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/using-ruby-web-service-from-a-c-net-client/78578>\
**Category:** Ruby\
**Created:** [December 7, 2006, 1:10am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/using-ruby-web-service-from-a-c-net-client/78578 "2006-12-07T01:10:59Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![ParappaYo](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/p/e99b99/32.png) [@ParappaYo](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/ParappaYo)\
**Post date:** [December 7, 2006, 1:10am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/using-ruby-web-service-from-a-c-net-client/78578/1 "2006-12-07T01:10:59Z")

</div>

I’m trying to set up a sample project of a Ruby web service consumed by  
a C# .NET client. I know that lots of people have managed to use an  
ASP .NET service from a Ruby client, but I am trying to do it the other  
way around. To keep things super simple, I’m just trying to get the  
following web service to work:

`
require 'soap/rpc/standaloneServer'
NS = ‘http://bushidoburrito.com/WebServiceTest’
class TestStuff
def test_string()
“blah blah”
end
end
class TestServer < SOAP::RPC::StandaloneServer
def on_init
test_stuff = TestStuff.new
add_method(test_stuff, ‘test_string’)
end
end
`

`serv = TestServer.new(‘WebServiceTest’, NS, ‘0.0.0.0’, 8080)
trap(‘INT’) { serv.shutdown }
serv.start
`

So far as I know, RPC::StandaloneServer doesn’t support WSDL (at least,  
I couldn’t figure out how to get it), so I built my own proxy class in  
C#:

`
using System;
using System.Diagnostics;
using System.Xml.Serialization;
using System.Web.Services;
using System.Web.Services.Protocols;
namespace WebServiceTestClient
{
[System.Web.Services.WebServiceBindingAttribute(Name=“WebServiceTestSoap”,
Namespace=“http://bushidoburrito.com/WebServiceTest”)]
public class WebServiceTestServer :
System.Web.Services.Protocols.SoapHttpClientProtocol
{
public WebServiceTestServer()
{
this.Url = “http://localhost:8080/”;
}
[System.Web.Services.Protocols.SoapDocumentMethodAttribute(“http://bushidoburrito.com/WebServiceTest/test_string”,
RequestNamespace=“http://bushidoburrito.com/WebServiceTest”,
ResponseNamespace=“http://bushidoburrito.com/WebServiceTest”,
Use=System.Web.Services.Description.SoapBindingUse.Literal,
`

`ParameterStyle=System.Web.Services.Protocols.SoapParameterStyle.Wrapped)]
public string test_string()
{
object[] results = this.Invoke(“test_string”,
new object[0]);
return (string) results[0];
}
}
}
`

When I call the web service on the client side, the results array has a  
length of 1 but results[0] is always null. I ran TcpTrace on localhost  
with both the web service and the client running locally to capture the  
traffic between them.

The request:

User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; MS Web Services Client  
Protocol 1.1.4322.2032)  
Content-Type: text/xml; charset=utf-8  
SOAPAction: “[http://bushidoburrito.com/WebServiceTest/test\_string](http://bushidoburrito.com/WebServiceTest/test_string)”  
Content-Length: 310  
Expect: 100-continue  
Connection: Keep-Alive  
Host: localhost:8081

\<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?\>\<soap:Envelope

xmlns:soap=“[http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/](http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/)”  
xmlns:xsi=“[http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance](http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance)”  
xmlns:xsd=“[XML Schema](http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema)”\>soap:Body\<test\_string  
xmlns=“[http://bushidoburrito.com/WebServiceTest](http://bushidoburrito.com/WebServiceTest)”  
/\>\</soap:Body\>\</soap:Envelope\>

* * *

And now the response:

HTTP/1.1 200 OK  
Connection: Keep-Alive  
Date: Wed, 06 Dec 2006 20:41:11 GMT  
Content-Type: text/xml; charset=“utf-8”  
Server: WEBrick/1.3.1 (Ruby/1.8.2/2004-12-25)  
Content-Length: 494

\<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?\>

\<env:Envelope xmlns:xsd=“[XML Schema](http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema)”  
xmlns:env=“[http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/](http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/)”  
xmlns:xsi=“[http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance](http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance)”\>  
env:Body  
\<n1:test\_stringResponse  
xmlns:n1=“[http://bushidoburrito.com/WebServiceTest](http://bushidoburrito.com/WebServiceTest)”  
env:encodingStyle=“[http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/encoding/](http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/encoding/)”\>  
blah blah  
\</n1:test\_stringResponse\>  
\</env:Body\>  
\</env:Envelope\>

* * *

I don’t know much about SOAP, but it seems to me that the Ruby web  
service part is working just fine. Is the problem entirely with the  
.NET client, then? And either way, is there anything that I can do to  
fix it?

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![ParappaYo](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/p/e99b99/32.png) [@ParappaYo](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/ParappaYo)\
**Post date:** [December 7, 2006, 3:11am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/using-ruby-web-service-from-a-c-net-client/78578/2 "2006-12-07T03:11:10Z")

</div>

ParappaYo wrote:

> I’m trying to set up a sample project of a Ruby web service consumed by  
> a C# .NET client. I know that lots of people have managed to use an  
> ASP .NET service from a Ruby client, but I am trying to do it the other  
> way around. To keep things super simple, I’m just trying to get the  
> following web service to work:

I’ve always had mixed luck trying to do soap between Ruby and .NET.  
Why not publish a REST interface instead? Those are easily consumed by  
.NET clients (I can post some sample code that uses a simple HttpClient  
object in .NET, if that woudl help). The Soap garbage just gets in  
the way, in my very humble opinion 🙂

Jeff

> **[Hey Daddio!](http://softiesonrails.com)**
>
> Home of Hey Daddio Software

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![ParappaYo](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/p/e99b99/32.png) [@ParappaYo](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/ParappaYo)\
**Post date:** [December 7, 2006, 8:21am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/using-ruby-web-service-from-a-c-net-client/78578/3 "2006-12-07T08:21:42Z")

</div>

On 12/6/06, Jeff [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) wrote:

> Why not publish a REST interface instead? Those are easily consumed by  
> .NET clients (I can post some sample code that uses a simple HttpClient  
> object in .NET, if that woudl help). The Soap garbage just gets in  
> the way, in my very humble opinion 🙂

He should really be using rails and actionwebservice, it makes this  
much easier. We have a fairly decent sized soap api based on  
actionwebservice and a number of .NET clients accessing it without any  
problems. It also creates a WSDL for you which visual studio will use  
without any complaints.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![ParappaYo](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/p/e99b99/32.png) [@ParappaYo](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/ParappaYo)\
**Post date:** [December 7, 2006, 8:45am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/using-ruby-web-service-from-a-c-net-client/78578/4 "2006-12-07T08:45:44Z")

</div>

On 12/6/06, Jeff [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) wrote:

> Why not publish a REST interface instead?  
> …  
> The Soap garbage just gets in the way, in my very humble opinion 🙂

True enough!

snacktime wrote:

> He should really be using rails and actionwebservice, it makes this  
> much easier.  
> …

Right, thanks for the tip. When I was looking into WSDL support, I  
came across that, but I wanted to see if I could still do it without  
Rails. I’m really only exploring this option to see if it could work,  
and I’m not particularly serious about using it. 🙂 Mainly I was  
wondering if anyone else had done this sort of thing or if there was  
some SOAP guru who could point out exactly why my .NET client doesn’t  
like the response that it’s getting. Of course, opinions like these on  
what I should be doing instead are most welcome.