SOAP Performance - Really so slow ?

[frankgerlach]

>From my simple performance tests of SOAP it seems that it is about ten
times slower than binary object request protocols such as RMI, IIOP or
SimpleORB.
Is this also YOUR experience ?

[Vadym Stetsyak]

I think, that everybody will have the same experience, because using SOAP
means that you will get more data then in binary mode. And if data size is
larger then network transfer of this data will be slow...

However, the flavor of SOAP is interoperabilit y with different systems (
e.g. you can have web service written in Java and clients on .NET or vice
versa ).
If interoprability is not your goal then it is better to use binary
protocols...

--
Vadym Stetsyak aka Vadmyst
http://vadmyst.blogspot.com
<fr**********@g mail.com> wrote in message
news:11******** **************@ g47g2000cwa.goo glegroups.com.. .

From my simple performance tests of SOAP it seems that it is about ten

times slower than binary object request protocols such as RMI, IIOP or
SimpleORB.
Is this also YOUR experience ?

[Bruce Wood]

....not to mention that serialization / deserialization will be slower,
and the routing of the request on the server side will be much slower.

As Vadym says, what SOAP (Web Services) give you is interoperabilit y:
the option to use various technologies for your clients, now or in the
future.

Binary protocols are definitely faster, but they lock you into having a
..NET server and .NET clients forever....

[j-integra_support]

If you want the advantages of interoperabilit y AND the performance of a
binary protocol, then J-Integra is the solution. J-Integra offers
interoperabilit y between .NET, Java, COM, and Corba applications
without the overhead of Web Services. The following whitepaper
summarizes a performance analysis of using J-Integra versus Web
Services for Java .NET interop...

http://j-integra.intrinsyc.com/pdfs/...ce_summary.pdf

Shane Sauer
J-Integra Interoperabilit y Solutions
http://j-integra.intrinsyc.com/
high performance interop middleware for java, corba, com & .net

[Scott Ellsworth]

In article <11************ **********@g47g 2000cwa.googleg roups.com>,
fr**********@gm ail.com wrote:

From my simple performance tests of SOAP it seems that it is about ten

times slower than binary object request protocols such as RMI, IIOP or
SimpleORB. Is this also YOUR experience ?

We had such problems at one point, then realized that we were doing a
SOAP call for simple data accessors. Once we bundled up the calls to be
somewhat higher level - returning whole collections of local objects,
for example, the overhead dropped to where we were willing to use SOAP.

If you are doing something very simple, RMI is going to just scream by
comparison to SOAP.

Scott

--
Scott Ellsworth
sc***@alodar.no spam.com
Java and database consulting for the life sciences

[Roedy Green]

On 28 Nov 2005 12:06:06 -0800, fr**********@gm ail.com wrote, quoted or
indirectly quoted someone who said :

From my simple performance tests of SOAP it seems that it is about ten

times slower than binary object request protocols such as RMI, IIOP or
SimpleORB.
Is this also YOUR experience ?

Just consider what goes down the wire for a
SOAP int.

<sometag>1234 5</sometag> = 24 chars.

vs two binary bytes.

--
Canadian Mind Products, Roedy Green.
http://mindprod.com Java custom programming, consulting and coaching.

[frankgerlach]

It's always the same: "Industry Standards" are propagated, regardless
of actual performance or suitability. Just because SOAP is the hype,
all major vendors seem to promote it, without even thinking about
alternatives... .
Publishing a "custom" client class library (for all major programming
languages) instead of WSDL would provide a tenfold better performance.
I wonder when the anti-SOAP backlash will happen....

[Andrew McDonagh]

fr**********@gm ail.com wrote:

It's always the same: "Industry Standards" are propagated, regardless
of actual performance or suitability. Just because SOAP is the hype,
all major vendors seem to promote it, without even thinking about
alternatives... .
Publishing a "custom" client class library (for all major programming
languages) instead of WSDL would provide a tenfold better performance.
I wonder when the anti-SOAP backlash will happen....

sure a custom or lightweight standard would give much higher
performance, but then we run into all kinds of problem areas:

technology - .net apps talking to mainframes...
Platform mapping - endianness
Language mapping - Java int is signed 32 bits, C++ has un/signed 1/2/4
bits depending upon complier.
etc...
All of these areas have been addressed in various ways by the various
comms standards: DCOM, CORBA, RMI, SOAP, etc..

Hell, most of the custom lightweight standards I've seen go over TCP/IP,
yet there are times when its preferable for sending data over raw UPD
sockets (as I've had to do in real time Telecoms apps).

What this boils down to, is that there is no 'Right' or 'OneTrue' way.

Each application needs to chose the right distributed technology for its
own characteristics .

Soap allows multiple different technologies, languages, platforms and
environments to communicate via a neutral 'self describing' means - but
this comes with a price - as you say slow performance.

but keep in mind, this slow performance may not actually be the bottle
neck within the system, so 'curing' it would be a false victory.
Andrew

[Andrew McDonagh]

j-*************** @intrinsyc.com wrote:

If you want the advantages of interoperabilit y AND the performance of a
binary protocol, then J-Integra is the solution. J-Integra offers
interoperabilit y between .NET, Java, COM, and Corba applications
without the overhead of Web Services. The following whitepaper
summarizes a performance analysis of using J-Integra versus Web
Services for Java .NET interop...

http://j-integra.intrinsyc.com/pdfs/...ce_summary.pdf

Shane Sauer
J-Integra Interoperabilit y Solutions
http://j-integra.intrinsyc.com/
high performance interop middleware for java, corba, com & .net

or there's ICE - http://www.zeroc.com/performance/index.html

which has the benefits of Corba without the rubbish and is highly
efficient too.

Andrew

[Jon Martin Solaas]

Bruce Wood wrote:

Binary protocols are definitely faster, but they lock you into having a
.NET server and .NET clients forever....

Really? Actually I think binary protocols were used a long time before
..Net was invented.