I use WSE 3.0 in a big production app for a client. It's a smart client app with web services as the backend. It's not even an interop solution. It's what the interop wonks call a SILO app. I have .NET on both ends and I control both ends. A perfect scenario for remoting or SSL. But I like web services. I like working with the tools and WSE let's me secure this stuff today.
WCF is the cool hot thing and it is the not-so-distant future for .NET messaging. All of the plumbers are busy becoming WCF experts. WSE on the other hand is seen as a “non-technology”, a band-aid to let us work with in WS-* while we wait for the robust implementations that are coming down the pipes. And me? What am I doing? I'm still teaching sessions on WSE 3.0 to sparse rooms with desparate developers who want to know how to use WSE in their live apps. I'm not cool. I'm not doing WCF sessions anywhere. I'm not working with it heavily. I'm happy to wait for Michele's book. And still I am being asked to talk about WSE3.0 while I chuckle knowingly at the teasing I get from some of the WCF gurus for agreeing.
I think the two most important things that WSE 3.0 brings developers are
- Secure web services TODAY in compliance with WS-Security
- Begin on the path to understanding WCF
The first is probably obvious and important to lots of people.
The second is an amazing side benefit that I always make sure I share with developers that I talk to about WSE, with the assumption that we will all move to WCF when the time is right. Combining WSE with .NET 2.0 web services starts us on the path to understanding bindings. Understanding the relationship between configuring policy declaratively to policy classes (out of the box or custom) helps in understanding bindings too. See a pattern? Address I understand. Contracts I understand. WCF Bindings always confused the heck out of me. Until I started moving from WSE 2 to WSE 3. That was a learning curve in itself. But I started noticing that I was understanding articles and demos of WCF much better.
So when the amazing series of web services webcasts starts up in June (check it out: www.LearnWebServices.net) and all the cool kids (who have gone through a lot of pain to learn WCF well enough to teach it brilliantly to me and you) will be doing webcasts on WCF, there will be one webcast in there on WSE 3.0 for the forgotten masses and guess who will be doing it? Yep, me.
One last thing on my little rant. (Oh, she was ranting?) I can' talk about the people who are struggling to learn and implement WSE 3.0 without acknowledging Pablo Cibraro (an MVP in Connected Systems) who almost single-handedly answers all of the questions on the WSE newsgroups. Pablo is also doing lots of cool work in WCF.