The Web services approach makes implementation in a virtually unlimited number of integration scenarios possible.
The Web service architecture provides highly flexible options for technical and business-side integration of correspondence processes in an enterprise.
Technical Integration
The standard interface of the Web services is the SOAP interface layer.
This provides the deepest possible integration option for Web services. Any programming language that can process SOAP can be used to develop native Clients.
Both server-side and client-side integration can be implemented on the basis of this interface.
Integration in a Web application is also possible, for example, by direct embedding in Active Server Pages or by integrating calls to Web services as Internet links.
Business Integration
The greatest advantage for business-side integration of Web service correspondence processes is the enormous flexibility it provides.
Correspondence generation with Content Composer consists of a number of complementary and collaborative interlinked activities. These activities can either be set to run automatically, or can be manually started and handled by a user.
The sequence in which these activities are preformed is defined by their dependency on results from preceding activities.
The Web services enable granular access to these individual activities.
This makes it easy to eliminate any unnecessary steps or to repeat one or more activities as individually required. The whole concept is geared toward flexible adaptation of technical procedures to specific business requirements.
Consider the following scenario as an example. The parameterization of data retrieval is very complex and implemented over a number of interdependent Web pages. Document selection, manual variable input and editing of documents is not desired. Only control documents should be displayed and, if correct, then archived directly.
With Web services, implementing a scenario like this turns out to be quite simple.