does axis 2 automatically create (and save) wsdl file?

Question

I have a web service up and running with eclipse/tomcat/axis2. I want to get it linked to a bpel process, so I need the wsdl file. I can display the wsdl by starting the server and going to

http://localhost:8080/axis2/services/MyService?wsdl

But if I search the directory structure for the project, I can't find the wsdl file. I can of course copy and paste the wsdl from the browser and save it as a text file, then point bpel to that wsdl. But it seems like axis 2 would generate (and save) a wsdl file for me, right?

Answer 1

By default, when you add ?wsdl, Axis2 does not retrieve a previously generated WSDL document. It is generated every time. But if you put the WSDL document file and the corresponding XML Schema files inside the META-INF folder in the service archive file, it can be recovered with:

http://localhost:8080/axis2/services/MyService.wsdl

The service name given in the services.xml and the service name defined in the WSDL document should be the same.

In another hand, if you want to save a generated WSDL document, simply run something like the following snippet as a Java Application on some class of your project, using the class org.apache.ws.java2wsdl.Java2WSDL.

public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception {
    Java2WSDL.main("-cn com.abc.MyService".split("\\s+"));
}

Once it has been executed, the generated WSDL document file and the corresponding XML Schema files you can find it in the folder of the project.

To find out more options to use them with this tool, use the following:

public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception {
    Java2WSDL.printUsage();
}