Absolutely - only the simplest of requests with the lowest of bandwidth requirements should use plain GET requests.
Beyond that you must use some form of detail encapsulation. SOAP is layer ontop of HTTP POST requests which is semi-standardized - ie how a number is encoded is standardized, you still have to code what parameters are going across the gap at both ends. There is a lot of hype about how standard SOAP is... you are still left with a lot of work to do! :-) Sometimes it is useful not to have too many dependancies on other packages or outside software, ie, if you can get away with a simple GET request in plain R, go for it, but as Duncan says, you need to beware of character encoding. s/ On 21/08/05, Duncan Temple Lang <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Sean O'Riordain wrote: > > for very low bandwidth IPC I'd just use a standard web page form using > > a GET... so all you have to do is call a URL with the parameters > > embedded in the URL, e.g. > > > > http://silly.name.for.server.com/javaServlet?a=42&b=394&c=1982&d=complex > > > > If your bandwidth requirements are a bit higher then you have to start > > using POST which is a bit more complicated though... so at that stage > > I might use SOAP. > > POST is not equivalent to SOAP. SOAP uses POST. > > In order to avoid all the details dealing with HTTP requests > such as escaping characters, SSL, passwords, POST/GET, etc., it is simplest > to use something that already takes care of these. > The RCurl package (www.omegahat.org/RCurl) is in interface libcurl which > takes care of > so many of these details. httpRequest (regular CRAN package) is implemented > entirely > within R, but doesn't handle as many of these extra details. > > D. > > > > > cheers! > > Sean > > > > On 21/08/05, Nigel Sim <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > Hi, I need to somehow make R communicate with another remote JAVA > > > process which provides compute services. I have control over the > > > communications protocol, but I would like to keep it to a standardised > > > protocol, such as SOAP, CORBA, etc. > > > > > > What I would like to know is, what do other people use to do this? The > > > nature of the communications will be low bandwidth procedure calls, with > > > little data. (The data is stored in a DBMS). To date I have tried the > > > RCORBA and SSOAP packages. Corba I couldn't get to compile, and soap I > > > couldn't get to talk properly to soapanywhere (the embedded soap > > > implementation I am trialing). > > > > > > I'm sure with persistence I can get both working, but I would like to > > > hear others experiences before I invest the time. > > > > > > Thank you for your time. > > > -- > > > Nigel Sim > > > > > > PhD Candidate > > > School of Mathematics and Physical Sciences > > > James Cook University > > > +61 7 4781 4247 > > > +61 409 277 641 > > > > > > ______________________________________________ > > > [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailing list > > > https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-devel > > > > > > > ______________________________________________ > > [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailing list > > https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-devel > > -- > Duncan Temple Lang [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Department of Statistics work: (530) 752-4782 > 371 Kerr Hall fax: (530) 752-7099 > One Shields Ave. > University of California at Davis > Davis, CA 95616, USA > > > > > > ______________________________________________ [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-devel
