Web Services Essentials

Compound Types

SOAP arrays have a very specific set of rules, which require that you specify both the element type and array size. SOAP also supports multidimensional arrays, but not all SOAP implementations support multidimensional functionality. (Check your chosen SOAP toolkit for details.)

To create an array, you must specify it as an xsi:type of Array. The array must also include an arrayType attribute. This attribute is required to specify the data type for the contained elements and the dimension(s) of the array. For example, the following attribute specifies an array of 10 double values: arrayType="xsd:double[10]". In contrast, the following attribute specifies a two-dimensional array of strings: arrayType="xsd:string[5,5]".

Here is a sample SOAP response with an array of double values:

<?xml version='1.0' encoding='UTF-8'?>
<SOAP-ENV:Envelope
   xmlns:SOAP-ENV="http://www.w3.org/2001/09/soap-envelope"
   xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
   xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema">
   <SOAP-ENV:Body>
      <ns1:getPriceListResponse
         xmlns:ns1="urn:examples:pricelistservice"
         SOAP-ENV:encodingStyle="http://www.w3.org/2001/09/soap-encoding">
         <return 
                              xmlns:ns2="http://www.w3.org/2001/09/soap-encoding"
                              xsi:type="ns2:Array" ns2:arrayType="xsd:double[2]">
                              <item xsi:type="xsd:double">54.99</item>
                              <item xsi:type="xsd:double">19.99</item>
                           </return>
      </ns1:getPriceListResponse>
   </SOAP-ENV:Body>
</SOAP-ENV:Envelope>

Note that the arrayType is set to xsd:double[2]. Each element ...