Consuming a web service using POST instead of the going the usual WSDL route

Question

This is how I have currently managed to consume a particular Microsoft web service. Notice that it is located on an HTTPS server and that it requires a username, a password, and a .cer file to be installed in the operating system's "root certificate authorities".

WSHttpBinding binding = new WSHttpBinding();

binding.Security.Mode = SecurityMode.TransportWithMessageCredential;
binding.Security.Message.ClientCredentialType = MessageCredentialType.UserName;
binding.Security.Message.NegotiateServiceCredential = true;
binding.Security.Message.AlgorithmSuite
  = System.ServiceModel.Security.SecurityAlgorithmSuite.Default;
binding.Security.Message.EstablishSecurityContext = true;

EndpointAddress endpoint = new EndpointAddress("https://address.of.service");

//"GreatClient" was created for me automatically by running
//"svcutil.exe https://address.of.service?wsdl"
GreatClient client = new GreatClient(binding, endpoint);

//Username and password for the authentication. Notice that I have also installed
//the required .cer certificate into the system's "root certificate authorities".
client.ClientCredentials.UserName.UserName = "username";
client.ClientCredentials.UserName.Password = "password";

//Now I can start using the client as I wish.

My question is this: How can I obtain all the information necessary so that I can consume the web service with a direct POST to https://address.of.service, and how do I actually perform the POST with C#? I only want to use POST, where I can supply raw XML data using POST directly to https://address.of.service and get back the result as raw XML data. The question is, what is that raw XML data and how exactly should I send it using POST?

(The purpose of this question: The reason I ask is that I wish to consume this service using something other than C# and .NET (such as Ruby, or Cocoa on Mac OS X). I have no way of knowing how on earth to do that, since I don't have any easy-to-use "svcutil.exe" on other platforms to generate the required code for me. This is why I figured that just being able to consume the service using regular POST would allow me to more easily to consume the service on other platforms.)

Answer 1

What you are attempting to do sounds painful to do now and painful to maintain going forwards if anything changes in the server. It's really re-inventing the wheel.

If you haven't considered it already, I would:

(a) Research whether you can use the metadata you have for the service and use a proxy generator native to your target plaform. There aren't many platforms that don't have at least some tooling that might get you part of the way if not all of it. Perhaps repost a question targetting Ruby folk asking what frameworks exist to consume an HTTPS service given it's WSDL?

(b) Failing that, if your scenario allows it I would consider using a proxy written in C# that acts as a facade for the service which translates it into something easier to consume (for example, you might use something like ASP.NET MVC WebAPI which is flexible and can easily serve up standards compliant responses over which you can maintain total control).

I suspect one of these may prove easier and more valuable than the road you are on at the moment.

Answer 2

I had to go through something similar when porting .NET WCF code to other platforms. The easiest approach I found was to enable message logging on the WCF client. This can be configured to save both envelope and body and once everything is working on the .NET side of the house, you can use the message log to have "known-good" XML request/response to port to other platforms.

I found this approach to be more elegant since I didn't have to add an additional behavior to log messages, and it can be easily enabled/disabled/tweaked in the config. The Service Trace Viewer Tool that ships with Visual Studio is also handy for reviewing the log files.