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Integrated Web Services for IBM i - Web services made easy

General Page

Integrated Web Services for i enables Integrated Language Environment (ILE) applications to play in the web services and service-oriented architecture (SOA) arena with little effort, knowledge, and resources. The convergence of web service and IBM i technologies can help enterprises liberate core business assets by making it easier to enrich, modernize, extend, and reuse them well beyond their original scope of design.

In today’s increasingly interconnected world, application programming interfaces (APIs) are becoming the digital reflection of an organization. Whether you call it web APIs or web services, getting started on IBM i is easier than ever with the Integrated Web Services for i. The bottom line is that flexible businesses require flexible IT, and the path to flexible IT is web services and SOA.

Announcements

Introducing IBM Remote System Explorer API (11 April 2023)
IBM introduces the Remote System Explorer (RSE) API.  IBM RSE API is a collection of REST APIs that allow a client to work with various components on an IBM i host system, including QSYS objects, IFS files, CL Commands, and database files. Further details in the RSE API web page.

Enable CORS and HSTS for IWS servers (18 August 2022)
New support added for cross-origin resource sharing (CORS) and HTTP Strict Transport Security (HSTS) in the integrated web services server. Read all about it in Technology Updates.

New logging enhancements (27 March 2022)
Logging in JSON format, HTTP access logging, and HTTP message logging are new features that can be used to enhance the observability of the IWS server. Further details in Technology Updates.

IWS Server versions 1.3 and 1.5 disabled in IBM i 7.2 (27 March 2022)
Starting with HTTP group PTF SF99713 - level 49, IWS server versions 1.3 and 1.5 no longer function due to the log4j version 1.x mitigation efforts.  Further details can be found in the Security Bulletin: IBM i components are affected by CVE-2021-4104 (log4j version 1.x).

Features and benefits

The IBM i operating system integrates software technologies that support the externalization of an Integrated Language Environment (ILE) program object as web services (also known as web APIs) and the consumption of services by an ILE program object. These technologies are the Integrated Web Services server and the Integrated Web Services client for ILE.

Integrated web services server -- The web service engine or run time is integrated in IBM i and is used to externalize ILE business logic as a service or API that can be called by various client implementations.

Features

  • Easy to use
    The web administrative GUI front end that allows you to manage and monitor the server and any deployed web services.
  • Leading edge
    The web services server is built on the powerful, yet lightweight, integrated application server and best-in-class technologies in support of SOAP and RESTful web services.
  • Small footprint
    Uses ILE programming architecture for minimal consumption of IBM i resources.

Benefits

  • Get started with no up-front costs
    The integrated web services server is part of the operating system, so you can get services up and running and show tangible results fast.
  • Focus on your core capabilities
    Solution providers do not require new skills or tools for the deployment of ILE-based web services and thus can focus efforts on building differentiated value for customers rather than rewriting core infrastructure.

Integrated web services client for ILE -- The web services client for ILE delivers a mechanism to generate service artifacts and allow ILE (RPG, COBOL, C, and C++) to act as a web service or API consumer.

Features

  • Uses quick interoperability of ILE programming architecture for minimal consumption of IBM i resources with a small system footprint
  • Ability to generate SOAP RPG, C, and C++ stubs that support document style literal only and complies with Web Services Invocation (WSI) 1.1 basic profile
  • Ability to consume SOAP and RESTful web services that use application-defined payloads

Benefits

  • No up-front costs
  • Uses and enhances existing IBM i development skills to interact with web services

Resources

Documentation

Related websites

Articles

Get insights and support

Technology updates

Information and details of new features and enhancements relating to Integrated Web Services support

Support

IBM HTTP Server Group PTF contains the PTFs necessary to use the Integrated Web Services for IBM i support. In addition, it is important that you ensure you have the latest Java group PTF

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Document Information

Modified date:
10 April 2023

UID

isg3T1026868

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