Integrating with a WS-Security (WSS) SOAP webservice

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I need to integrate with a SOAP webservice that requires a WS-Security header. As for as i understand I won't be able to fix this with the option to add custom headers in the webservice call, since it is static information. One of the elements in the header contains a signature of the message using a certificate. So this will only work once the whole message is know. I've also looked in the App Store and i'm not aware of a module that could help with this. I'm currently thinking of creating a Java action to gets the message body as a String input and the endpoint of the service as input. Than in Java i could generate the necassary WS-Security headers and send the message. The response will than be passed back to the microflow. Creating the request body could then be done using the default Export Mappings and parsing the result could be done with the Mendix Import Mappings. Off course I would have to take care of the Key- and Trust Stores in Java. So any suggestions or help would be appreciated.
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4 answers
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We encountered the same issue and now, after quite some hassle, have a working solution in place, based on the way described in the post from Kilian.

We indeed made a custom java action which has a certificate file and XML-string (generated by the Mendix export to XML) as input, and signs the request with the WSS header elements. It then sends the signed request and has the response of the web service call as output variable. the response can then be mapped with the regular Mendix XML import.

Pity that Mendix doesn't make it possible to easily send a custom request to a published service, but instead always manipulates the request that is being send. That would make this a lot easier.

 

 

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Hi,

 

Unfortunately, there is no pre-built method for applying WS-Security signing and encryption.

To accomplish WS-Security, I implemented Java code that utilizes the following libraries (Axis2, Axiom, Neethi, Rampart) to consume the endpoints. Among these libraries, Rampart specifically handles the signing and encryption of both incoming and outgoing requests.

 

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I think you are correct in your assessment of the situation and how to work around this. In essence you can probably use something like this as your guide for the basics. But it might turn out to be more complicated than this if the published web service has any additional requirements for the exact format in which the message should be sent.

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We use VPN with employee tracking software. Perhaps it will help.

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