Re: [stp-dev] Java First Programming Model Refactor

[Oisin Hurley <ohurley@xxxxxxxx>]

> Sounds like a job for... EMF. Perhaps we should introduce an EMF based
> Customizable WSDL2Java, Java2WSDL tool, and not just pass through  
> to the underlying implementation. Leaving the templates open to  
> further customization. That way, domain/application specific WSDL  
> could be generated.

Just the sort of thing I was thinking of, Mark :)  I know that Ed Merks
has created an EMF model for WSDL 2.0, which I'm sure already holds a
Schema model and could very well be compatible with the WSDL 1.1 that is
in the greatest usage today.

Making a WSDL code generator using this EMF model at the core would be
cool. Make it an OSGI application and we have this nice feature where
we can run it as a command-line java application, or just pull in the
model part and make it part of the Eclipse UI. The backend generation
could even be replaceable, using OSGi service techniques for general
applicability (or extension points if we want to be more tightly bound
to Eclipse). Same goes for the front end of course - it would be
relatively straightforward to construct a DSL that we would translate
to the WSDL model for use with existing tools. This might save
developers some grief.

Now for the dark side of the equation: there are hundreds of people
who have put tens of thousands of hours into the several dozen
WSDL2Mumble generators out there. They probably don't want to do it
all again, or port it :) That being said, it probably makes sense
for companies to think about bringing in a WSDL processing framework,
since that isn't a competitive element in their products.

 cheers
  --oh

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