Understanding Web Services [Part I]

A web service is a platform–independent software component that contains a group of functions that are packaged together for use in a common framework throughout a network. Web services are based on the Simple Object Access Protocol or SOAP, a XML-based protocol that allows data exchange even through the firewalls. In this series of articles on Web Services, I would discuss the related terminologies and concepts and how we can implement Web Services (synchronous and asynchronous) in Microsoft.NET. I would like to start this series with a basic understanding of WSDL, UDDI and SOAP which I feel, are essential for having a proper understanding of Web Services.