WCF v.s. legacy ASP.Net Web Services [duplicate]

Question

Possible Duplicate:
Web Services — WCF vs. Standard

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Could anyone recommend me some documents to describe why WCF is better than legacy ASP.NET web services? I am especially interested in performance and security.

Answer 1

WCF is much more flexible:

• can be used over HTTP (like legacy ASMX)

• but also: can be used over NetTCP, MSMQ, wsHttp and so on

• WCF services can be hosted in IIS (like legacy ASMX)

• but WCF services can also be self-hosted in a console app, Windows NT Service, etc.

• WCF offers a lot more security features and security levels than ASMX (message security etc.)

• WCF offers things like reliable messaging, transaction support etc.

In WCF, almost anything is configurable in a config file - much more so than with ASMX.

I don't have any ready-made documents at hand that describe this - but that's really the essence of it, I'd say.

Marc

PS: Not sure if this one would contain anything useful for you:

http://whitepapers.techrepublic.com/abstract.aspx?kw=remoting&docid=270830

PPS: you would think that Microsoft would have heaps of these white papers to convince folks - but no..... :-)

Answer 2

George,

I don't have any such documents handy, because it's so obvious why WCF is better.

First, because of Microsoft: ASMX Web Services are a “Legacy Technology”. They're also publicly stating that they will not be making changes to WSDL.EXE and other parts of the ASMX technology. We have enough trouble in this Industry with legacy technology and applications - it makes no sense to create a new piece of legacy code today.

Second, WCF abstracts the concepts that are part of ASMX, Remoting, and WSE. "Anything they can do, WCF can do better".